On Monday 6 May, the European Committee for Standardization (CEN) and the European Committee for Electrotechnical Standardization (CENELEC) announced that they had published a document which also constitutes their contribution to the consultation launched by the European Commission on past, present and future European framework programmes for research and innovation (R&I) (see EUROPE 13109/21). These contributions will feed into the development of the strategic guidelines for the Horizon Europe 2025-2027 plan.
CEN and CENELEC underline that the R&I framework programmes are increasingly focused on the impact of R&I on the uptake of innovative solutions in industry and society to address global challenges.
The two organisations also believe that standards can act as a catalyst for innovation and encourage or help researchers to commercialise their innovative ideas and scientific results.
In addition, according to their analysis of the Horizon Europe 2021-2022 work programmes, 125 call topics referring to standardisation were identified and 72 CEN and CENELEC technical committees developing standards were identified as relevant to some of these calls.
The document also contains proposals for the next Horizon Europe calls and suggests, in particular, that more reference be made to standardisation in the text or themes of the calls as a tool for improving the impact of projects and better integrating project results into the market.
CEN and CENELEC believe that existing standards can be better examined to learn lessons and provide guidance on best practice in innovation.
Link to the paper: https://aeur.eu/f/c39 (Original version in French by Émilie Vanderhulst)