On 9 August 2022 the Directorate-General for Research and Innovation of the European Commission adopted a proposal for a Council Recommendation on the guiding principles for knowledge valorisation. The intention is to increase social and economic value from knowledge and to transform data and research results into sustainable products and solutions. Secondly, principles and measures for local, regional and national policy makers will be harmonised with a view to maximize the transformation of research and innovation (R&I) results into solutions that benefit society. This proposal is to replace the previous Commission Recommendation dating back to 2008 on the management of intellectual property in knowledge transfer activities and a Code of Practice for universities and other public research organisations.

The expected Council Recommendation foreseen for later this year is a milestone of the new European Research Area (ERA). Developing these guiding principles for knowledge valorisation was proposed in the Commission Communication on “A new ERA for Research and Innovation” of September 2020 and was included in the ERA Policy Agenda for 2022-2024, endorsed by Council Conclusions on the Future governance of the ERA in November 2021. They build on the co-creation by the ERA Forum subgroup on knowledge valorisation established by the informal Commission expert group on the ERA Forum for Transition.

Boosting knowledge valorisation is essential to deliver rapidly new solutions to global challenges and opportunities created under the green and digital transformation. Leveraging the full value of intellectual assets generated by R&I activities require the management of intellectual assets in a broad sense, such as patents, copyrights, trademarks but also data, know-how, prototypes, processes, practices, technologies, inventions, and software.

The guidelines will be further supported by two codes of practice on the smart use of intellectual property and for researchers on standardisation.

Read the full proposal here.