Meeting European Innovators at the EIC Summit 2025

EIC Summit 2025

Last week, Strategic Business Developer Claudia Pfander and Anne-Charlotte Joubert, Senior Officer for European Affairs, represented Euro-BioImaging at the European Innovation Council (EIC) Summit in Brussels. The event brought together innovators, policymakers, and funders to discuss the future of European innovation and offered an opportunity to learn about some of the most exciting start-ups in Europe.

EIC Beneficiaries' Day

The first day was dedicated to EIC beneficiaries and featured workshops on topics such as investments, intellectual property, and scaling businesses.

Claudia was invited to join a workshop panel alongside Ed Mitchell (ESRF) and Jan Bjaalie (eBRAINS), moderated by Carsten Dreher from the EIC Board. In front of a full room, they discussed how research infrastructures can support start-ups and scale-ups, sharing use cases and addressing audience questions.

EIC Summit 2025 impressions

All photos by EISMEA Communications.

Meeting EIC grantees during the many networking sessions highlighted some of the needs that young companies are facing and that Euro-BioImaging as a distributed research infrastructure can easily address:

• Finding a reliable service provider and in-build guarantee of service provision due to a multi-site setup to minimize disruption risks
• Validating new technologies across multiple sites and in real-life environments according to common standards and protocols
• Identifying new application use cases to attract investors
• Acquiring user data and feedback for new technologies

Late-stage grantees, e.g. EIC Accelerator might primarily seek VC and equity funding or support for entering non-European markets, but these examples highlight that Euro-BioImaging can play a crucial role in bringing a new technology to market. After a first matchmaking event last year, Euro-BioImaging is currently exploring other opportunities with EIC Programme Managers to connect to early stage Pathfinder and Transition projects and individual beneficiaries in the imaging field.

Flagship event

The EIC Summit continued with a second day focusing on policies. In her keynote speech, Commissioner Zaharieva highlighted the remarkable achievements of the European Innovation Council (EIC), positioning it as Europe's leading early-stage tech investor. With over 150 investment rounds and €1.5 billion in co-investment, the EIC has fostered breakthrough innovations and supported the growth of 70 new startups. The summit emphasized the need to close the innovation gap with global competitors and introduced initiatives like the "fifth freedom" to integrate innovation and knowledge into Europe's single market.

Carlos Moedas and Enrico Letta underscored the importance of storytelling and creating a supportive regulatory environment to make Europe the premier destination for global innovators. The event concluded with a call for urgent leadership to transform ideas into action, reinforcing Europe's commitment to innovation and economic resilience.

EIC Partners’ Day

Preceding the EIC Summit, Claudia participated in the EIC Partners’ Day, an exclusive event dedicated to exchange between service providers in the EIC Business Acceleration Service (BAS) catalogue, grantees and EIC officials. During the day, workshop participants worked in groups to identify how to better support grantees with relevant services. The participants agreed that coaching of grantees and a close communication with Programme Managers was needed to identify and match needs at the right time in a company’s life cycle. At the same time, low-barrier matchmaking tools can help create visibility and quick outreach opportunities for service providers, but they might need to adjust their language to resonate with start-ups. Euro-BioImaging offers access to imaging services and consultancy on imaging and image data-related questions as official EIC partner.

EIC Pathfinder Info Day

Anne-Charlotte concluded the Brussels EIC week, attending the EIC Pathfinder Info Day. This event highlighted the program's commitment to fostering breakthrough scientific and technological innovations with a dedicated budget of €262M. With a focus on both open ideas and specific challenges, providing participants with deeper information on the programme prior to breakout sessions organised according to the 2025 Pathfinder challenges, including the one on generative AI in medical diagnosis and treatment. This session presented the expectation from the programme manager, Federica Zanca, to build her portfolio and emphasized the importance of collaboration and strategic planning. Participants gained insights into the competitive application process, funding opportunities, and the significance of building synergistic project portfolios. Participants were also encouraged to consider connecting with existing European Research and Clinical Infrastructures, like Euro-BioImaging.  It ended with a matchmaking session through short pitches to further facilitate potential collaborations, underscoring the EIC's dedication to advancing high-risk, high-gain research for societal impact.

Outlook

Overall, the EIC Summit underscored the importance of opening a dialogue with users, enhancing visibility and better aligning the service offer with the needs of start-ups and SME, but also opened doors for future collaborations aimed at supporting innovation across Europe.

Article contributed by Claudia Pfander and Anne-Charlotte Joubert