The Europe INNOVA Annual Partnering Event kicked-off in Copenhagen on 14 June. The three-day event was held in conjunction with the EPISIS INNO-Net and focused on the theme of ‘Services innovation as a catalyst for the Europe 2020 strategy.’

Roger Proctor, Chair of the South West Design Forum, was invited by the European Commission to address high-level policy makers at the Europe INNOVA

The event set out to identify the new business support mechanisms that are needed to promote services innovation generally in support of European policy. It brought together 200 national and regional policy makers, representatives of service industries and innovation support providers.

Roger, as the sole industry representative from the design sector from across Europe, described the practical solutions that the South West Design Forum are developing in order to improve the sector’s capacity, productivity, sustainability and innovation.

Roger outlined that European governments and institutions have only just begun to realise the important economic, social and cultural contribution of the creative industries. Significantly, design has been identified as one of the most important strands.

However the vital contribution of the design sector to the economy and society has largely, up until now, thrived without governmental intervention. Also in order to face the challenges of an increasingly competitive world and media convergence, designers need to move beyond their present business models into other and new dimensions.

Roger highlighted the challenges of how we should harness and develop this sector further to ensure that it is competitive and world beating in the future, without inhibiting what has already been a successful model.

He posed the question of whether this should this be done from the ‘top down’ by regional, national and European policy makers, or perhaps it could be achieved more effectively from the ‘ground up’ by the industry and practitioners themselves.

He highlighted that by all parties understanding and working with the design sector and its structures we can:
• Build capacity and improving productivity
• Promote and ensure knowledge transfer
• Develop sound design policies for sustainability

Most importantly all of this can and should be achieved through local, regional, national and international professional networks ‘owned’ and run by the industry itself that can listen, understand, share, plan, support and deliver what is required.

However there are significant challenges to be faced by the sector. These networks, where they exist, face difficulties in making participation worthwhile and acceptable for the industry. There is no doubt that resources and time are in short supply and financial sustainability is often the overriding issue.

At the end of the conference the European Commission announced two important initiatives:
1. The “European Creative Industry Alliance” between regions that wish to strengthen their creative industries and are willing to support SMEs in other sectors to take better advantage of creative solutions, such as design.
2. The Commission will commit at least €100 million in support of the creative industries and the better use of creativity by other industrial sectors, particularly design.