Do it differently

A paradigm shift is needed in Europe if we are going to foster the rise of a private entrepreneurial creative class to address issues including sustainable development, information technology, alternative energy and overall European growth.

Conventional thinking tends wrongly to dissociate technology from industrialisation; but the fact is that they are symbiotic. As a result, countries with overly-developed service sectors like the US, UK and France have lost significant ground to countries in Asia and to Germany.

Everyone is equal: some are more equal than others

We cannot, and should not, manage the innovative arenas of countries with 60 million or more people in the same way we would manage that of countries of 5 to 10 million people.

The Singapore ‘society of brain power’ will not work for large countries like France or Germany. Both countries need to be a “brains trust” and to be coupled with high value industrialisation. Together, the 27 countries of the European Union will never play on an equal basis, but they all have a chance to excel in what they do best; this is no different from the US or Canada.

Part of the focus should also be to develop key demonstrators that address the medium-term technologies and the long-term horizon, in order to guarantee a continuum of innovation across Europe. Demonstrators are the visible materialisation of core competencies of teams, regions and countries.

Help or get out of the way: government's role is to foster innovation

Large companies are better positioned to support small and medium enterprises for innovation. If we couple this leading position with effective government support, innovation with both public and private value will succeed.

In Europe, our goal should not be to please everyone, Europe must continue to develop its leaders and effectively encourage entrepreneurial innovation to discover new leaders, in order to stay competitive. Trying to be politically correct and please everyone will only harm Europe's long-term business and policy goals.

Today's bureaucratic reality is the challenge to tomorrow's dreams

Today's situation leads to waste of both of time and money and will discourage small and large private actors from entering the market. This is not an idealistic view: it is a pragmatic one. In the end, transforming the way we do innovation across Europe is a very expensive endeavour.

Project size does matter

Research is not optimised and cross-disciplinary across the European Union. We need to clearly identify the redundancies that exist in the various EU Commissions. We need fewer programmes but bigger ones - that are better funded. These will be easier to manage, less costly - due to less administration - and better understood by the entire community.

We no longer have big European ‘Flagship’ programmes that would help both the private and the public sector to rally together and push for a new renaissance of innovation and industry. The Galileo satellite programme is the last of a rare European species. Not only do these types of inspiring programmes create long-term technological value, they also develop skills and expertise for all European nations. Such programmes also bring local industrialisation that is good for all of Europe.

Continental ‘co-opetition’: a win-win concept for Europe and North America

Europe and North America should be cooperating much more closely to develop the next generation of fuels (among many other new technologies) to replace conventional carbon fuels. The results of this Europe-US collaboration to find acceptable alternative fuels would be positive co-opetition: both continents would reap the benefits from the research, technology and production know-how.

Patent, protect and promote: one European patent policy

Patents are still the best tool, in a fair economy, to help protect our innovation crown jewels. The countries that do not comply with World Trade Organisation rules do not deserve to be part of any collaboration in research domains and we should not encourage any research programmes with such actors.

Recommendations - a path forward

1. In order to truly unleash innovation across Europe, we cannot treat all EU nations equally - this is neither practical nor realistic. Europe needs to define itself based on the strengths and weaknesses of each of its members, and to foster areas of excellence in each country or region.

 2. It is time for the European Commission to concretely define with the leaders of Europe what the 'Big Programmes' are for the next 30 years that will ignite an entire new mind set of innovation and research throughout the continent.

3. The focus should also be to develop key demonstrators. Demonstrators are the visible manifestation of core competencies of teams, regions and countries.

4. We need to clearly identify the bureaucratic redundancies that exist in the various Commissions, and that discourage entrepreneurs from entering the market.

5. We need fewer, but bigger research programmes - that are better funded.

6. Some EU organisations could be established or existing ones better-funded in order to guarantee all the metrics for success are met; less money should be spent on administration and redirected to core programme management and resources.

7. These programmes need to be managed as real industrial programmes and not the way we manage conventional research programmes today. Time and deliverables are of the essence; and the more time and quality one loses in the upstream, the less chances one has to be first to market.

8. Better and more-focused small projects should be allocated to certain countries rather than the peanut butter effect: trying to spread projects so thinly across too many countries - and often to countries that do not have any competency relevant to the given project.

9. There should be a great simplification of the funding mechanisms, and all European countries should have an incentive through pan-European tax credits.

10. Transatlantic collaboration and co-opetition should be encouraged and implemented in all areas that require new knowledge to be developed.

For Europe, the key to the future resides in the coupling of innovation/industrialisation: trying to dissociate them will be a major mistake.

Short-sightedness will result in the exodus of European brain power to other countries that are far more aggressive and ready to acquire knowledge, as countries fully respect that the competition is now on a global scale and they understand it takes a long time to build such a foundation.

Jean J. Botti is Chief Technical Officer and Member of the Executive Committee of EADS

Disclaimer: the views and opinions expressed in this paper are the personal perspectives of Dr Botti and do not necessarily represent the position of EADS and its Divisions.