Brussels, 19/04/2005 (Agence Europe) - On 26 April the Commission will announce the three best innovative projects and award each of them EUR 200,000. The European Information Society Technology prize is an initiative of the European Council of Applied Sciences, Technologies and Engineering (Euro-CASE), an independent non-profit making organisation that brings together national applied science academies from 19 European countries. It is supported by the European Commission. Fabio Colasanti Director General of DG Information and Media presented the 20 candidates to the press, declaring, “Europe wants to meet the challenge of growth, research and innovation…it has to go further, raise public awareness among Europeans on what innovation and research represented”. This year 430 candidates enrolled from 29 countries from the European Union or associated countries. Most were submitted by SMEs (78%), the remainder from big companies (9%), universities (3%) research institutes (2%) and others (8%). Information technologies are the most represented sector (284 projects).