As of Monday, the European Commission is encouraging people to vote for their favourite future digital innovator and innovation in the 2016 Innovation Radar Prize.
This year’s 40 nominees come from every corner of Europe, from SMEs, university teams, spinoffs and start-ups. Their ideas could transform areas from transport logistics to water management, to the treatment of cancer patients to the management of bee populations, for instance. They are developing digital innovations in projects funded by the EU’s research, competitiveness and innovation programmes. Nominees have been identified by the European Commission’s Innovation Radar, an initiative that aims to identify high potential innovations and key innovators, based on a model developed by the European Commission’s DG CONNECT services and the Joint Research Centre’s Institute for Prospective Technological Studies.
Voting runs for the entire month of August to identify the 16 innovators (4 from each of the 4 categories) who will pitch their ideas to an expert jury at ICT Proposers Day event in Bratislava on 26 September 2016. Like last year, the jury will select a winner for each category and an overall winner who will be featured on a special Euronews programme. Broadbit, the winner of the 2015 Innovation Radar Prize has subsequently closed multiple business angel investment rounds to finance expansion and production of their innovative battery technology. Günther H. Oettinger, European Commissioner for the Digital economy and society, said “With Horizon 2020 the EU is investing heavily to support digital innovators. Thousands of EU-funded research and innovation projects with a digital focus have been launched so far in this decade. Now we are about to reveal which of them are best placed to take their results to the market or have the potential to deliver the biggest impact.“
