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Closing the innovation gap in the EU: how can finance contribute?

Day 1 Afternoon

Wednesday 09 April

Room :

ROOM 1

Speakers

Chair
Rolf Strauch
Chief Economist and Member of the Management Board - European Stability Mechanism (ESM)
Public Authority
Sandrine Ménard
Deputy Assistant Secretary, Financial Markets and Corporate Financing - Ministry of the Economy, Finance and Industrial and Digital Sovereignty, France
Industry Representatives
Andreas Widegren
Head of Public Affairs Sweden - Nordea
David Serrero
Head of Investment CDC Tech Premium - Caisse des Dépôts (CDC)
Lazaros Panourgias
Head EIF Affairs, Brussels & EIF SG Senior Adviser - European Investment Fund (EIF)
Yann Le Pallec
President - S&P Global Ratings
Other stakeholder & expert
Axel A. Weber
President, Center for Financial Studies - Goethe University Frankfurt

Objectives

In the face of global trade and economic challenges, innovation is more important than ever; insufficient investment in innovation threatens to undermine the prosperity of the European Union, while its competitive gap with the United States in particular continues to widen.The competitiveness compass for the EU underlines that “the route to reviving growth is to rekindle productivity based on innovation… Europe needs to be at the forefront of innovation tech sector that will be matter in tomorrow’s economy such as AI, biotechnologies, clean energy technologies, robotics, space technologies and others”. The question is whether, after the failures of the Lisbon Strategy (2000) and the 2020 Strategy (2010), the actions set out in this compass will succeed this time in bridging the innovation gap, whether the methodology used will be more effective and whether cooperation between Member States will be sufficient.The objective of this session is first to analyse where the financing problems lie in the development of innovation in Europe. The debate will then focus on the required actions, policy and tools needed to close the funding gap in Europe.

Points of discussion

  • To what extent do financing problems explain the innovation gap in Europe?
  • Are the solutions identified in the EU Competitiveness Compass (EU start-up and scale-up strategy, 28th regime for innovative companies, measures for boosting European Venture Capital, EIB Tech investment programme…) appropriate and sufficient to close the innovation gap?