Twenty-two NATO member states launched the Alliance’s new innovation fund on Thursday 30 June.
“This fund is unique. This is the world’s first ever multi-sovereign venture capital fund”, explained NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg at the signing ceremony of the participating nations’ letter of engagement.
According to him, the fund will invest €1 billion in early-stage start-ups and other venture capital funds developing emerging dual-use technologies which are priorities for NATO across the 22 participating nations. These include artificial intelligence, big data processing, quantum technologies, autonomy, biotechnology and human augmentation, new materials, energy, propulsion and space, the alliance said in a statement.
The 15-year NATO Innovation Fund, which complements the NATO Defence Innovation Accelerator for the North Atlantic (DIANA), “will help bring to life the emerging technologies that have the power to transform our security in the decades to come”, said Stoltenberg, adding that it will also strengthen the Alliance’s innovation network.
The participating countries are Belgium, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Spain, Turkey and the United Kingdom.
In addition, the Allies agreed that innovators participating in DIANA programmes will have access to a network of more than nine accelerator sites and more than 63 test centres in Europe and North America (https://aeur.eu/f/2fv ). (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant)