NEWS

Prof. Knut Blind has been reappointed as Chair of CEN-CENELEC Working Group STAIR (Standards, Innovation & Research) for three more years, until the end of 2024. STAIR is the focal point within CEN and CENELEC for any matter related to integrating standardization with innovation and research.

Standardization and innovation are linked. Successful innovation requires attention for various aspects: what is the new technology like, what is the economic aspect, how does it help society and what is sustainability? Standardization contributes to increasing the chance of success for innovative concepts.

The 2021 edition of the CEN and CENELEC Standards+Innovation Awards was presented on Tuesday 5 October 2021 to celebrate and acknowledge the important contribution of research and innovation to standardization.

On 5 October, CEN and CENELEC are happy to host the third edition of the Standards+Innovation Awards.

STAIR4SECURITY (Standards, Innovation and Research for Security) is a project funded by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme. The project has been coordinated by CEN with the involvement of four National Standardization Bodies (AFNOR, ASI, DIN and SIS), together with the Chairperson of CEN/TC 391 'Societal and Citizen Security', TFC Research and Innovation Limited, National University of Ireland Galway, and KPMG Future Analytics. The project started in January 2019 and  ended in June 2021.

Standards+Innovation Awards are back for their third year. The Awards celebrate the contributions of researchers, innovators and entrepreneurs to standardization and acknowledge the important contribution of research and innovation to standardization. This year they include the annual Project Award, presented to a European research / innovation project (H2020 / Horizon Europe) who successfully contributed to standardization, and Individual researcher/innovator Award, presented to an individual who successfully introduced her/his research outcome or innovation into standardization.

Standards have a fundamental value in supporting and mainstreaming research and innovation. Yet, this value is very often misunderstood or underrated, also by policy makers – with very serious consequences for the ability of innovation ecosystems to scale up. This issue is at the heart of a new study published by Alfred Radauer, Driving from the Fringe into Spotlight: the underrated role of standards and standardization in RTDI policy and evaluation.

Standards help researchers bring their innovation to the market and give credibility over the development of an innovative technology, and start-ups and spin-offs to scale up their business.