Today, the European Association of Innovation Consultants is releasing its first collective report “A Guide to Next Generation EU for industry to better understand and seize its opportunities.”

The pandemic caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus has led to an unprecedented health and economic crisis in our society. Companies of all sizes and entire sectors have been impacted by the pandemic. To overcome this crisis, strengthen and transform our economy, making it greener, more digital and more resilient, creating new opportunities and more jobs, the Commission has launched a temporary instrument, called “Next Generation EU,” which raises the European Union's budget to €2.018 trillion in current prices, the largest economic stimulus ever funded by the EU.

The European Commission’s DG for Research and Innovation (DG RTD) has launched a Manifesto for EU COVID-19 Research, which aims to maximise the accessibility of COVID-19 research results that benefit from EU funding.

Today, EWGIC has signed this manifesto and commits to sharing research results related to COVID-19 prevention, testing and treatment.

By signing this manifesto, EWGIC and its members commit to

• Make the generated results, whether tangible or intangible, public and accessible without delay, for instance on the Horizon Results Platform, on an existing IP sharing platform, or through an existing patent pool.
• Make scientific papers and research data available in open access without delay and following the FAIR principles via preprint servers or public repositories, with rights for others to build upon the publications and data and with access to the tools needed for their validation. In particular, make COVID-19 research data available through the European COVID-19 Data Platform.
• Where possible, grant for a limited time, non-exclusive royalty free licences on the intellectual property resulting from EU-funded research. These non-exclusive royalty free licenses shall be given in exchange for the licensees’ commitment to rapidly and broadly distribute the resulting products and services under fair and reasonable conditions to prevent, diagnose, treat and contain COVID-19.

​This initiative is in line with the Coronavirus Global Response, launched by Ursula von der Leyen, President of the EC, as well as with the Solidarity Call to Action, established by the World Health Organisation.

Read the full Manifesto here.
More information here.