The manufacturing industry is a global base for prosperity and key to Europe’s economic, social and environmental sustainability. The sector is a main driver of industrial innovation, job creation and growth.

EIT Manufacturing brings together a growing network of top-tier industrial partners, leading academic and research institutions from across the region and innovative startups, scaleups and SMEs.

A key way of transforming knowledge into value is by overcoming the fragmented nature of many innovation networks. In order to ensure that innovations reach the market, industry has the right talent and entrepreneurs can thrive; EIT Manufacturing connects and integrates the areas of education, innovation and business creation.

Ultimately,  EIT Manufacturing strives to accelerate faster innovation with the potential to improve everyday life globally, help meet Europe’s ambitious climate goals, and ensure that its workforce is ready for tomorrow’s challenges.

About the community

This innovation community will bring together all actors in this innovation ecosystem and should lead to innovative products, services and also processes.

There are 6 general objectives

• Upskilling the workforce and developing the talent
• Creating efficient manufacturing innovation ecosystems
• Digitizing the manufacturing industry
• More on-demand and customer focused manufacturing
• Manufacturing that looks at health, ethics, social acceptance and safety
• Environmentally sustainable manufacturing

Programmes

These objectives are reflected in five different schemes for which organizations, researchers and industry (knowledge triangle) can apply:

• Business creation of high-growth companies to lead the transformation of the manufacturing industry in Europe
• Education of current and future workforce to make sure they are equipped to work with the technologies of the future
• Innovation where they develop technologies and bring them to the market as ready-made innovative products, services and processes
• Regional innovation schemes to help countries and regions that are lagging behind in terms of manufacturing innovation
• Activities where they work together with other innovation communities to create cross-sectoral innovations

How to get involved?

The EIT publishes regularly calls for proposals for these different programmes. You can find out the opportunities and latest news at the webpage of the innovation community https://www.eitmanufacturing.eu/ or https://eit.europa.eu/our-communities/eit-manufacturing

The headquarter of this innovation community is in Paris but there are several regional hubs. There is no office in Belgium and Flemish interested parties need to contact the Darmstadt hub by mail central@eitmanufacturing.eu

You can also attend or watch InnoveEIT, the annual conference of the EIT where you can meet other members of the communities and experts of the EIT itself.

Finally you can contact the NCP for manufacturing, mark.antonissen@vlaio.be