Unlocking the potential of SMEs in the Digital Single Market – Innovation, IP protection and partnering for success

On Tuesday, 23^rd of June 2015, SME Europe of the EPP in cooperation with Qualcomm invited to a working breakfast in the European Parliament. The topic was “Unlocking the potential of SMEs in the Digital Single Market – Innovation, IP protection and partnering for success”.

Mrs. Elisabetta Gardini, Member of the Committee on Public Health and Food Safety, Senator and Chairwoman of the working group microbusiness of SME Europe of the EPP, introduced the topic by putting emphasis on the importance of creating the right incentives for SMEs to do research and development in order to create new opportunities. She also reminded the audience of the importance of stimulating entrepreneurship in order to boost innovation and productivity of SMEs through using their intellectual property efficiently. She hopes that projects like the L2P platform from the Politecnico de Milano will help Europe’s SMEs to do that.

 

Iuliu Winkler MEP, Vice-chair of the Committee on International Trade and Vice President of SME Europe, emphasized the importance of SMEs when it comes to innovation in the European economy in general. He also pointed out that these SMEs have to innovate to improve their productivity. Through their higher competitivity they create new jobs not only in quantity but also in high quality.

 

The debate was followed by Don J Rosenberg, Executive Vice-President, general counsel and corporate secretary of Qualcomm Incorporated, who presented the L2p project  and highlighted the importance of intellectual property in the innovation process of SMEs. He stressed the importance of cooperation between SMEs for innovation and of sharing their knowledge by the way of patents for example.

 

Eva Paunova MEP, Member of the Committee on the Internal Market and Consumer Protection, stressed that the Digital Single Market is a machine with different parts with innovation at its core and that it will be a benefit for SMEs to generate innovation and commercialize it profitably. She also reminds the guests that underlying protection of Intellectual property needs to be at the center of a cultural revolution.

 

Professor Gaetano Gascini Professor at Politecnico di Milano, Faculty of Industrial and Information Engineering, explained the L2p project in detail. How the thematics of intellectual Property Fundamentals are transmitted in useful information to SMEs and how it connects SMEs to each other to share their know how on different levels. He also stressed the importance of intellectual property in general as a way to share information and to protect innovation.

 

Alex Voss MEP pointed out that the European policy about innovation should be more ambitious to permit SMEs to be more creative and to be able to innovate especially in the framework of the Digital Single Market. Mr. Voss said that Europe already lost the first part in the race to become a champion in the digital world and that we have to find better solutions to get to the top for the second part.

Cristinia Gutierrez-Cortines former MEP also stated that Europe has a lot of potential for innovation but has to get smarter to connect the different areas of innovation.

 

The speeches were followed by an interesting discussion with members from the commission, MEPs and other interested stakeholders.

The publication of this document received financial support from the European Parliament. Sole liability rests with the author. The European Parliament is not responsible for any use that may be made of the information contained therein.