EIT Culture & Creativity – a game changing organisation for a prosperous Europe

As one of the founding partners of the INNOVATION BY CREATIVE ECONOMY (ICE) partnership, Trans…
Published on June 24, 2022

As one of the founding partners of the INNOVATION BY CREATIVE ECONOMY (ICE) partnership, Trans Europe Halles (TEH) is proud to announce that The Governing Board of the European Institute of Innovation & Technology (EIT) has selected the ICE Partnership to establish the EIT Culture & Creativity.

The ninth Innovation Community is set to start operations in 2023 with the mission to boost the competitiveness of European Cultural and Creative Sectors and Industries (CCSI) and strengthening their role as drivers of prosperity for Europe.

The ICE- Innovation by Creative Economy partnership, coordinated by Fraunhofer and chaired by interim CEO, Bernd Fesel, was selected from among five consortia in a process finalised on 22 June 22, in Budapest, Hungary. The winning proposition is designed to unlock the latent value of the cultural and creative sectors and industries to become a gamer changer for Europe’s Green, Digital and Social Transformation. EIT Culture & Creativity will receive over 150 million euro support from the EIT over two seven-year periods before becoming self-sustainable.

Upon the “Created in Europe” motto, the ICE partnership assembles a carefully crafted pan-European consortium of 50 excellent universities, research institutions, companies, investors, and associations relevant to all CCSI in 20 nations. “Diversity is the front door to innovation. We are proud to have built a consortium that is diverse in many ways, but especially one that honours the nature of European CCSI: ours is a sector made by multitude of SMEs and very small players”, says Bernd Fesel, Interim CEO and spokesperson of the winning team.

The CCSI are key drivers of economic growth and job creation across Europe. They account for 5.5 percent of the EU’s total GDP and 6.2 percent of Europe’s workforce, 80% for all 2.9 million CCSI companies are small and micro enterprises. At the same time, they are not just business -they stand for European diversity as well as its unity. EIT Culture & Creativity will be key to support Europe’s recovery and cohesion. “This will be an Open innovation Community: open to entrepreneurs, artists, freelancers, social innovators, cultural agents. Innovation and change are possible when the all players -the large and the small, for profit and non-profit- meet at eye level in collaboration spaces for addressing pressing societal challenges”, concludes Fesel.

Within this partnership, TEH ambitions are to

  • Scale up its efforts to diversify the cultural leadership and practices in Europe
  • Investigate creative solutions and new financial instruments/models to sustainably transform cultural spaces and buildings
  • Strengthen TEH’s entrepreneurial/social innovation initiatives at a global level
  • Develop a strong digital and youth strategy for the culture sector
  • Stand strongly for the reinforcement of a bold EU model of IP protection, value of artistic creation, prevention from GAFA hegemony and content standardization.

What will EIT Culture & Creativity do?

  • Break boundaries in CCSI education by teaching cutting-edge technology to creatives and creativity as a cross-industry skill, increasing multidisciplinary collaborations of higher education leaders with creative industry economics, nurturing imaginative, creative businesspeople and market-savvy artists and designers.
  • Deliver mission-driven innovations leveraging the change-making power of CCSI to develop eco-systemic services and products rebuilding Europe after the COVID-19 pandemic as a carbon neutral continent. EIT Culture & Creativity will provide experimental spaces to enable creative innovations stimulated through research and technology transfer and early adoptions in emerging high growth global markets.
  • Transform CCSI businesses through custom-fitting innovation support, incubation schemes, and novel investments and philanthropic financing connecting existing networks of 2 000 creative hubs, 3 000 cultural institutions and 300 000 entrepreneurs across Europe.
  • Mainstream the impact and value of CCSI especially culture and heritage as an enabler for economic regeneration, and societal cohesion by supporting regions, cities and rural areas, to facilitate industrial and social changes including climate adaptation and mitigation.
  • Deepen the acknowledgement and knowledge of CCSI´s unique contributions to research and innovation ecosystems based on novel, data-driven methods, implemented standardisation of knowledge exchanges and smart monitoring of facts and figures. EIT Culture & Creativity will facilitate impact-driven dialogues with best-in-class innovators and policymakers at all levels to unlock the potential of cultural and creative sectors and industries for a sustainable and thriving society.

What will EIT Culture & Creativity Achieve?

By 2030, EIT Culture & Creativity will have delivered:  

  • 1 500 graduates from EIT-labelled programmes
  • 44 000 professionals upskilled in 200 lifelong learning courses
  • 400 tested innovations, 155 marketed innovations, 5500 IP entries
  • 1 100 organisations supported to expand their business and reach
  • EUR 80 million invested in start-ups with 200 start-ups created
  • 250 initiatives that promote and celebrate EU identities, values and culture
  • 100 CCSI-driven community (re)generation initiatives
  • 1 800 CCSI organisations transformed to be more digital, green and social.

 

Find out more: https://eit.europa.eu/

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Contact

  • Tiffany Fukuma – Phone: 0046-76 290 1450
  • Fairooz Tamimi – Phone: 0046-73 621 4982