Brussels wants to make the European Innovation Council more like the legendary US innovation agency, but currently the differences are large
Photo credits: Brian Ramos / Unsplash
Any EU equivalent to the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) must be fully independent, speakers at a debate on how Europe could create its own innovation agency have stressed.
Right now, the European Innovation Council (EIC), touted by the EU as a partial answer to DARPA, is not independent from the European Commission and lacks the powerful programme managers seen as key to DARPA’s success, panellists warned at a Science|Business conference on February 6.
The past six months have heard a drumbeat of calls in Brussels for new ways to stimulate innovation, potentially following the US’s ARPA model.
An influential report last year by former Italian prime minister Mario Draghi suggested developing a “European ARPA-type…
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