"On 18 March 2022, we proudly celebrated the very first anniversary of the fully-fledged European Innovation Council. During this one-year period, with determination and hard work, we achieved important milestones in our ambition to identify and support breakthrough technologies so they can scale up and create new markets.

There have been many highlights in the past year, but we are particularly proud of the fact that we received record numbers of applications (over 1300) for the EIC Pathfinder, high level interest in the EIC Accelerator (over 5000 applications) and launched the new EIC Transition programme. The first 164 startups have been selected for funding of close to €1 billion. Moreover we see the growing impact of the EIC pilot, which now counts five unicorns among the companies supported.

Another milestone was the first hybrid EIC Summit in November 2021, which brought together more than 2300 participants onsite and online, with 40 engaging and informative sessions and contributions of 200 high-level speakers including Commissioners Gabriel, Vestager and Breton. This was the occasion to announce the inspiring winners of the Women Innovators, the iCapital and the Innovation Procurement prizes as well as the launch of the EIC Forum.

In the run up to the EIC Summit, the Commission appointed the first EIC Board of 20 leading lights from the European innovation eco-system, to advise on the strategy and implementation of the EIC from early stage research to the financing and scale up of start-ups and SMEs.

There is still a long way to go to realize our ambition to become Europe’s unicorn factory, and there remain many challenges to overcome, such as putting in place a fully operational EIC Fund. But with the enormous pool of talented researchers and innovators in Europe we are confident that we will unleash the EIC’s potential – and with that, yours!"