General Information

The EIT Regional Innovation Scheme (EIT RIS) is the EIT Community’s outreach scheme. It was introduced in 2014 to share good practices and experience emerging from EIT Community activities and to widen participation in EIT’s activities across Europe [1].

The EIT RIS opens up the activities of the KICs to innovators that are not partners, by providing targeted support to individuals and organisations to take part in and benefit from the KICs’ activities, services and programmes [1]. The EIT RIS focuses on countries with limited or no participation in the EIT Community’s activities, where innovation capacity is moderate or modest and which otherwise would not be able to benefit from the experience gained by the KICs [2].

Countries eligible to take part in the EIT RIS are [2] :

EU Member States: Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Romania

H2020 Associated Countries in Europe: Albania, Armenia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Faroe Islands, Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Georgia, Moldova, Montenegro, Serbia, Turkey, Ukraine

Implementation of EIT RIS:

Each Innovation Community has designed its own EIT RIS Strategy fully aligned with its objectives and activities. EIT RIS activities are implemented via the Innovation Hubs (Co-location Centres) across Europe. If an Innovation Community has not set up an innovation hub in an EIT RIS eligible country, it will designate EIT Hubs. These EIT Hubs will be local organisations selected through an open process that will cooperate with the Innovation Communities and local organisations from business, education and research [1].

Engaging local players in ongoing KIC activities

The KICs are expected to engage local players—individuals (notably students, researchers) and entities (e.g. start-ups, scale-ups, universities, research labs, NGOs, regions and cities)—in KIC activities within the three main areas by practically demonstrating the benefits of Knowledge Triangle Integration (KTI) [2]. Below is a list of example activities:

Education: KICs may set up EIT RIS scholarship programmes for their educational programmes, carry out targeted information campaigns and networking events to promote opportunities provided by KICs, trigger and facilitate industry involvement in educational programmes/ projects domestically and internationally, develop internship programmes for graduates in EIT RIS countries in accordance with the KTI model [2].

Entrepreneurship: KICs may set up dedicated programmes on how to increase participation of the start-ups and scale-ups in KIC business acceleration programmes, support start-up creation, provide networking and matchmaking opportunities, develop internship programmes for SMEs from EIT RIS eligible countries, establish partnerships with local business and innovation hubs [2].

Innovation and Research: KICs may involve local start-ups in technology and know-how transfer, engage students benefiting from the EIT RIS (e.g. by specific scholarships) in innovation projects and run pilots and tests of the outcomes of KIC innovation projects, and involve researchers from the EIT RIS countries in KIC innovation projects [2].

Other Informations

Please visit the websites of the Innovation Communities for more information on the EIT RIS activities that are being implemented and for other information.

EIT Climate-KIC: http://www.climate-kic.org/programmes/eit-regional-innovation-scheme-ris/

EIT Digital: https://www.eitdigital.eu/about-us/arise-europe/

EIT Health: https://www.eithealth.eu/innostars

EIT InnoEnergy: http://www.innoenergy.com/about/eit-ris/

EIT Raw Materials: https://eitrawmaterials.eu/eit-regional-innovation-scheme-ris/

[1] https://eit.europa.eu/activities/outreach/eit-regional-innovation-scheme-ris

[2] https://eit.europa.eu/sites/default/files/eit_ris_guidance_note_2018-202...