Final Report Summary - SILICON EUROPE (Developing a leading-edge European Micro- and nanoelectronics cluster for energy efficient ICT)
Executive Summary:
1 Executive Summary
Micro- and nanoelectronics (MNE) are essential for the prosperity of Europe: Micro- and nanoelectronics are everywhere. Without this technology, we would have no computers, mobile phones, household appliances or motor vehicles. Further down the value chain, electronic components also contribute to the improvement of manufacturing processes and thereby enable new technologies to evolve. Micro-and nanoelectronics are a key driver for innovation in almost all sectors and industrial fields. The European Commission, by designating micro- and nanoelectronics as one of Europe’s Key Enabling Technologies, acknowledges the importance of the sector for the development of industry in Europe as well as for the future prosperity of the entire continent.
As a Key Enabling Technology, micro- and nanoelectronics, including the use and production of semiconductors, are essential for all goods and services, which need intelligent control and communication. This applies to sectors as diverse as transportation, health, security and energy. To counteract the increased global demand for energy and to avoid undesirable environmental consequences, more intelligent and efficient management of conventional fuels and their utilization is necessary and this is where micro- and nanoelectronics become indispensable.
Silicon Europe is the brand under which the leading micro- and nanoelectronics (MNE) clusters in Europe collaborate to represent, support and promote the companies and organisations belonging to their ecosystem both on European and global level. Silicon Europe acts as intermediary between all the relevant partners from research and academia, public authorities and the industry. Within the project, six world-class clusters from five leading micro- and nanoelectronics regions have collaborated to create an open European collaborative platform to strengthen the leading role of the European semiconductor industry in the global economy and value chain. Based on that work, the members of Silicon Europe have a three-year experience in successful collaboration within the cross regional ecosystem facilitating cross regional partnerships and business relations.
The major outcome of the project is the Joint Action Plan, a step-by-step strategy for the time till 2018. It describes the agreed actions to be taken by the Silicon Europe meta-cluster in order to complete the goal of the project: “make Europe the world leader in innovative electronics”. The cluster partners identified five strategic themes that need to be addressed in order to strengthen Europe´s competitiveness. The decision was taken to continue the strong cooperation beyond the timeframe of the project, as an association welcoming other European micro- and nanoelectronics clusters and further deepening the partnership to implement the Joint Action Plan. Another six European clusters have joined the Silicon Europe Alliance in October 2015. The new members enlarge the Silicon Europe partnership both geographically and technologically. Now the Silicon Europe Alliance unites 12 European micro- and nanoelectronics clusters with about 2,000 cluster partners.
Project Context and Objectives:
2 Project context and objectives
Five of the leading European micro- and nanoelectronics regions have joined their research, development and production expertise to form the transnational, research-driven cluster “Silicon Europe – The Leaders for Innovative Electronics”. The cluster partners include national consortia that all have established structures for the close cooperation of research, business and the authorities (“triple helix”). Within the triple-helix consortia are the following six strong MNE cluster:
•Silicon Saxony (Dresden, Saxony, Germany)
•Minalogic (Grenoble, Rhône-Alpes, France)
• DSP Valley (Leuven, Flanders, Belgium)
• High Tech NL (Eindhoven, South and East Netherlands, The Netherlands)
• Business Cluster Semiconductors (Nijmegen, The Netherlands) as associated partner
• ME2C (Villach, Carinthia, Austria) as associated partner
The partners of Silicon Europe are linked by a common goal: to secure Europe its position as the world’s leading centre for innovative electronics. While aiming to reach this main goal, Silicon Europe will make substantial contributions toward realizing several partial goals that will be of crucial importance for Europe´s future economy (regarding Europe´s competitiveness), science (regarding the securing of know-how for the manufacturing of KET-relevant technologies) and society (regarding solutions for global mega trends).
Within the project, the six world-class clusters from the five leading micro- and nanoelectronics regions have collaborated to create an open European collaborative platform to strengthen the leading role of the European semiconductor industry in the global economy and value chain.
Silicon Europe will intensify the transnational collaboration between the regional research-oriented competence clusters and will make a substantial contribution to the “Europe 2020” agenda, an economic program initiated by the European Union. The program’s focus is the advancement of research and development (R&D). This includes the development of environmentally friendly technologies as well as activities to secure consistent economic growth. The Silicon Europe partners bring together their know-how and concentrate on realizing the two flagship initiatives “Resource Efficient Europe” and “Digital Agenda”. The results of the Silicon Europe collaboration will produce an additional positive effect on the “Industry Politics in the era of Globalization” as well as the “Agenda for new Capabilities and Employment”.
The specific objectives of Silicon Europe are:
1) Promotion of micro- and nanoelectronics as Key Enabling Technology for the traditional industry, unlocking new solutions for the major societal challenge on energy efficiency. This promotion will be supported by the development of a new communication concept on the strategic importance of micro- and nanoelectronics.
2) Securing European know-how for Europe: Using inter-cluster synergies and complementarities
a. with research institutes and universities, for access to the newest technologies and to highly qualified competencies and staff,
b. with fabless design houses for the development of new functionalities and/or architectures for the micro- and nanoelectronics,
c. and with value adding system integrators for the market valorisation.
3) Opening up new markets and boosting competitiveness especially of SMEs by improving innovation and technology transfer from research to market, and by developing an internationalization strategy inside and outside Europe, supported by the creation of a common identity for a (virtual) European semiconductor cluster.
Problem description – The need for resource and energy efficiency
Due to the emergence of developing and transitioning countries - particularly China and India - and the resulting rise in living standards of the population, world energy demand is dramatically increasing. All scenarios within the “Energy Roadmap to 2050” show electricity will have to play a much greater role than now and will have to contribute to the decarbonisation of transport and heating/cooling. Electricity could provide around 65% of the energy demands of passenger cars and light duty vehicles, as shown in all decarbonisation scenarios. Final electricity demand increases even in the high-energy efficiency scenario. Consequently, according to the Roadmap, prime focus should remain on energy efficiency. Therefore, improving energy efficiency is a priority in all decarbonisation scenarios and thus also one of the major challenges with regard to the flagship initiative of a resource efficient Europe.
Contribution of micro- and nanoelectronics to the solution of the problem
As one of the key enabling technologies, micro- and nanoelectronics, including semiconductors, are essential for all goods and services which need intelligent control in sectors as diverse as automotive and transportation, aeronautics and space. Smart industrial control systems permit more efficient management of electricity generation, storage, transport and consumption through intelligent electrical grids and devices . Smart control systems are also crucial to increasing the efficiency and reducing the unwanted emissions related to the use of conventional fuels (oil, coal and natural gas) in all its forms and applications.
Nevertheless, Europe has a number of dedicated regions with critical mass and particular semiconductor competencies which are recognised world-wide. These clusters, which jointly will implement Silicon Europe, address all application fields and have access to the most advanced technologies.
Micro- and nanoelectronics are the basis for a strong European economy. There is no computer, mobile, appliance or even car without it. Electronic components also contribute to improving manufacturing processes or to enabling new communication technologies. Thus, micro- and nanoelectronics are a key driver for innovation for almost all sectors and a key enabling technology for the vast number of industrial fields and sectors.
Without key enabling technologies, such as micro and nanoelectronics leading to new applications within building automation and controls as well as demand response, achieving substantial energy efficiency improvements will only remain a dream.
As a conclusion, the most urgent challenge in micro- and nanoelectronics is to increase massively energy efficiency, especially in its key sector ICT. This need arises from the future availability of resources (the finite nature of fossil fuels) and the increasing demand for energy worldwide (also, since even the continued development of renewable energies will not be enough close the large gap in demand). Substantial progress can only be achieved through key innovations and new system approaches that are based on a combination of cutting-edge in scientific research, close-to-market development and world-leading know-how in manufacturing processes.
By joining technological expertise and resources of Europe’s leading actors in European micro- and nanoelectronics the Silicon Europe cluster, will create a new quality of transnational collaboration. This will enable Europe to become the world’s leading centre for energy efficient electronics while effectively working to counteract increasing energy demand.
The participating clusters form the core for a leading edge cluster dealing with one of the most important key enabling technologies, namely micro- and nanoelectronics. Based on their unique combination of synergetic strengths, Silicon Europe has the potential to contribute significantly to the achievements of the aims of the Strategy for a resource efficient Europe.
Silicon Europe will have a global visibility and will also be highly competitive, focusing on the innovation component of energy efficiency.
The following picture shows the competences and strengths of the involved clusters on different levels.
Figure 1: Competences and strengths
Silicon Europe’s efforts in micro- and nanoelectronics will significantly contribute to Europe’s economic and innovative strength – both in the short and the long term. In the short term, micro- and nanoelectronics will help traditional industries to open up new markets and their utilisation will lead to the increase of energy efficiency in all sectors. Furthermore, Silicon Europe completes and strengthens the value chain of Europeans semiconductor eco-system and will be a role model for inter-cluster cooperation. Ultimately, the European semiconductor industry will be boosted and thus enabled to take on the Asian and global challenge on the market. The Silicon Europe initiative will raise the awareness of the importance of the European semiconductor industry in the wider public and authorities.
The capacity to generate innovations and successfully transfer them to the market is a key skill for Europe. This innovative force is decisive for the competitiveness and therefore ultimately for Europe’s sustainability. In order to maintain and strengthen Europe, securing the innovative ability must be equated with securing the future of Europe. It is a task to look far ahead into the future and to detect even weak signals in order to identify any resulting changes, to verify the relevance of these changes and assess them from a strategic viewpoint.
Micro- and nanoelectronics have a major impact on and therefore will make a significant contribution to the successful handling of the mega trends, Europe is confronted with, including e.g. climate protection, a society that is shifting from industry to knowledge, the globalisation and optical, energy and environmental technologies. Mostly, the sector’s developments and its findings regarding energy efficiency are effecting not only the technical disciplines but also the population’s daily life.
Project Results:
3 Main S & T results/foregrounds
3.1 Overall Strategy
Silicon Europe was organised in six work packages. There were three different implementation phases of the project:
a) phase 1 (WP 2) = in-depth analysis phase, allowing to have a comparable information basis for the decisions to be made in phase 2 for all participation clusters as well as mapping of other relevant micro- and nanoelectronics clusters including relevant key indicators.
The decision on the differentiation of S&T objectives on the regional level (harmonised smart specialisation) while using all potential synergies forms the milestone MS1 that leads to the shift into phase 2.
b) phase 2 = the core of the project: Within WP 3 and WP 4, a Joint action plans was drafted with regard to the smart specialisation, additionally there will be an harmonised joint action plan for the virtual cluster at a European level. In this regard, within WP 4, a dedicated strategy for internationalisation have been developed.
This includes also dedicated actions in an internationalisation strategy for dealing with the global competitors as well as potential collaborators (e.g. clusters in UK or Italy) on a European level.
c) phase 3: Within WP 5, accompanying measures such as joint recruitment campaigns and joint training sessions have been taken place in order to facilitate the implementation of the action plan(s).
WP 1 – Management as well as WP 6 – Communication and dissemination were implemented throughout all phases, allowing a smooth implementation within time, budget and quality of the envisaged objectives. Within WP 6 different ways of communicating the key messages were developed for the different target groups.
Figure 2: Phases of project
Figure 3: Timeline work packages
3.2 Main Outcomes
The main outcomes of the project are:
• Extension of partly existing cooperation between mature European micro- and nanoelectronics clusters
• In-depth SWOT analysis of existing policies of the relevant stakeholders and development of respective recommendations for improvement/harmonisation, contributing to the development of regional smart specialisation strategies
• Development of Joint Action Plans within the participating regions
o joint strategy for internationalisation
o transfer of best practices between the regions regarding improvement of collaboration
o dedicated financial plan for implementation
• Boosted competitiveness through the development of a joint internationalisation strategy, including development of a common visual identity, and including partnerships with other European and world-wide clusters
• Staff exchanges to initiate common projects
• Promotion of the visibility of regional research driven clusters and promotion of the utilization of micro- and nanoelectronics as key enabling technology, by a series of regional level and European level workshops, development of various communication material
3.2.1 In depth analysis
During phase 1 (WP 2) an in depth-analysis of the involved regional ecosystems and clusters were made to identify complementarities, synergies and smart specialisation potential. The analysis gives an inside into the existing local situations considering the following topics:
• Regional RTD and economic development policies, plans and activities
• Regional public and private RTD actors as well as financial actors related to RTD
• Existing regional smart specialization strategies
• Existing regional cluster policies
Data collecting was completed with report D2.1 Regional cartography on RTD.
For all cluster partners a common semiconductor value chain were defined, which was the basis of the detailed analysis of the respective regional ecosystems.
Figure 4: Silicon Europe Value Chain
For data access reasons, only companies that are member of one of the relevant cluster organisations have been assessed.
Cluster members that are not directly involved in the semiconductor value chain (such as public authorities or companies delivering horizontal services such as accounting etc.) have not been taken into account.
Figure 5: Silicon Europe Cluster structure, # of organisations
Figure 6: Silicon Europe Value chains, # of organisations
Figure 7: Silicon Europe Market focus
A regional SWOT analysis from an economic, innovation and RTD perspective has been elaborated for each region to explore the potential for each region for a smart specialisation strategy. It can be concluded that all five clusters together have strengths along the whole semiconductor value chain. An overview for all clusters is shown in figure 8 (bigger font means the cluster has particularly high competences compared to the other regions). The regional SWOT analysis was completed with the report D2.2 “Regional SWOT analysis from an economic, innovation and RTD perspective”.
Figure 8: Joint value chain with focus for potential smart specialisation
Common weaknesses for all regions are linked to the typical small and medium sized enterprises structure, for example, less impact on policymaking, dependency on large enterprises or less production volume. Most of the clusters see strong potential for future growth in the field of applications and application platforms. There is even a clear expectation that by combining competences from the different regions, this field should become a strong European asset. Key aspects are actions to work out a strategy and take action to enhance the inter-European cluster cooperation as an enabler on specific (technological) topics. It is important to improve the cooperation between SMEs (the majority in all clusters) and the large enterprises (the largest employment source). Asia as the upcoming innovator has been identified as common threat of all five clusters. There are overlaps of competences per region as well differences, for example in the sub value chain for equipment or Systems.
Figure 9: Sub value chain equipment, , # of organisations
Figure 10: Sub value chain systems, # of organisations
Based on this regional data, a structured European matrix were developed. One hundred common SWOT indicators have been identified. These have been grouped and ranked according to a common priority by general consensus. This format allows a comparison of the data and an evaluation of the joint strengths and the individual complementarities needed to build a strong cluster cooperation. The 24 high-priority indicators are listed the table below.
Figure 11: Consolidation for the commonalities and complementarities with high priority
The results of the report D2.3 Complementarities analysis as well of D2.1 and D2.3 are the basis for phase 2, the development of a Joint Action Plan and internationalisation strategy.
3.2.2 Joint Action Plan
In phase 2 (WP 3) the Joint Action Plan (JAP) was developed. It describes the strategy to realise the objectives as have been defined for the Silicon Europe meta-cluster together with a concrete implementation roadmap for 2016 – 2018.
Based on the analysis of the commonalities and complementarities the starting point for developing a joint action plan was the list of 24 high priority actions. These actions has been further analysed by the cluster organisations with the support of appropriate cluster members. Several meetings with regional stakeholders have been arranged to gain insight in the needs and wishes of the regional actors and to validate the finding of WP 2. A further reduction of action items has been made towards a manageable number of JAP elements. 14 action items were selected and described in detail in so-called “fiches”, a kind of preliminary project outlines.
1. Initiate involvement in KET pilot lines
2. Facilitate matchmaking for smart specialisation
3. Regional and European support for economic development activities
4. Availability of technologies for electronics for efficient and future power applications
5. Increase the international visibility of the cluster
6. Regional and European support for the internationalisation strategies
7. Initiate participation of SMEs in Horizon 2020
8. Initiate participation of SMEs in JTIs (ECSEL)
9. Initiate strategic cooperation with foreign clusters
10. Focus on markets related to energy efficiency
11. Facilitate knowledge transfer
12. Detect market opportunities outside the regional markets
13. Open foreign markets for SMEs
14. Support to the development of essential technologies
Out of these 14 action items six project outlines have been defined and presented to regional and international experts for feedback.
1. Create a European MNE meta-cluster
2. Technology & knowledge
a. Make sure the required key technologies within the MNE field are available and when relevant also producible in Europe
b. Make the state of the art knowledge and know-how, both on technological and economic/business levels, available to the companies of the different clusters
3. Implement the smart specialization strategy
4. Bridge the gap between SMEs and funding instruments
5. Increase the business opportunities for the companies belonging to the cluster(s) by international business development
6. Promote the MNE technology to both the public and the politics
Projects 2 to 6 cover the full scope of the activities needed: financial support, market, technology and knowledge, smart specialisation and communication all bound together through the product value chain. The first project outline, the creation of a European MNE meta-cluster, is necessary to enable the execution of the different projects in a sustainable cooperation mode between the leading clusters
For the final Joint Action Plan five strategic themes have been selected.
1. Knowledge and technology transfer
Clusters support exchange throughout Europe
Within this theme, Silicon Europe will mainly take charge of the following activities:
• Technology market fairs where targeted markets will be brought into contact with MNE developers to align their respective roadmaps and also to set-up collaborations
• Mapping of the knowledge and technology sources
• Organisation of academic colloquia with a low threshold level for the industry
• Support of a human capital actions addressing mobility, education, training, and most importantly
• promoting the MNE industry as a challenging and rewarding sector for an excellent career
• Encouraging and supporting the creation and use by SMEs of platforms as field labs, pilot lines and competence centres
2. Smart Specialisation
R&D along the regional strongholds and markets
Within this theme, Silicon Europe will mainly take charge of the following activities:
• Support in the creation and international use of regional field labs
• Develop new approaches, in order to emphasise on economic transformation and on building interregional value chains
• Establish a platform for an exchange of experiences and best practices for the implementation of micro- and nanoelectronics based on smart specialisation strategies throughout the Silicon Europe consortium
• Support the cross-regional cooperation of both ERDF and regionally funded projects, support project consortia to match ERDF funds with H2020 projects or vice versa
3. SME funding
Clusters liaise SMEs to sources of capital
Within this theme, Silicon Europe will mainly take charge of the following activities:
• Acting as an intermediary between SMEs and different public and private financing opportunities through providing information, networking opportunities and assistance in acquiring the skills needed to access different funds
• Actively contributing to designing SME-friendly funding programmes
• Identification and contacts of accelerators abroad
• Organizing events to attract venture capitalists (VCs)
• Supporting both SMEs and e.g. VCs in judging and appreciating the investment needs and risks
4. International business development
Increase international visibility and consequently detect and create opportunities for the (SME) members
Within this theme, Silicon Europe will mainly take charge of the following activities:
• Support electronics companies, and more in particular SMEs, to be present in foreign markets either for business or partnerships:
• Increasing visibility and attractiveness of the European industry abroad at first in Taiwan and in the US, subsequently in other markets (such as up and coming European regions and outside the EU)
• Support to the implementation of joint innovation projects
• Support in scouting possible foreign commercial opportunities for the Silicon Europe partner companies
• Attract foreign investment money or actors missing in Europe’s value chain
5. Promotion of micro- and nanoelectronics
Communicate at large the indispensable role in to-day´s and future society
Within this theme, Silicon Europe will mainly take charge of the following activities:
• Initiating case-studies showing the essential role of MNE, promoting MNE in the whole value chain linked with application and narrated in an accessible way
• Initiating MNE companies to explain the technologies and their value to a broad audience
• Communicating on the strengths of the European MNE industry in Europe and abroad
3.2.3 Internationalisation Strategy
Within phase 2 (WP 4), the Silicon Europe partners have also done a thorough analysis of clusters outside Europe. Taiwan and USA have been clearly identified as the regions with the highest priority. The analysis was supported by a clusters benchmark of potential interesting competing regions (D4.2 “Report on international partners”).
Different lists of tables were created which allowed the Silicon Europe cluster partners to prioritise and rank the most important clusters for future collaboration (D4.1 “Report on tools for collaboration”).
• List of European MNE clusters
• List of European application clusters
• List of international clusters
• List of European events
• List of worldwide events
Table 1: List of European European micro-nanoelectronics cluster (extract of D4.1)
Given the results of the WP 2 SWOT consolidation and priorities, it was decided to enlarge this list to include some European application clusters.
Table 2: Selected European Application clusters
The next table shows the selected worldwide MNE clusters.
Table 3: Selected worldwide MNE clusters
Table 4: Summary table about types of clusters, Europe and World Wide
To be able to measure the success of the internationalisation of Silicon Europe a list of indicators was created.
Table 5: List of indicators
An internationalisation plan for the regions and countries beyond Europe was defined. Main activities are exploration, matchmaking and communication. Taiwan has been chosen as the first country to approach.
Figure 12: Overview of interesting regions
The deliverable D4.3 shows how cluster members will be supported in their international action, both within and outside Europe, to increase their activities, to develop business relationships, to attract financing and to continue to innovate. The Silicon Europe partnership has established a recognisable brand, by using the critical mass that the meta-cluster represents, to increase visibility of the European MNE industry in their actions abroad and to global attract key player to come to Europe to exercise their activities.
Mission to Taiwan
Taiwan has been selected as one of the priority regions outside of Europe as part of the Silicon Europe internationalisation strategy. Several activities to explore and further develop the relation between Europe and Taiwan have been defined as part of this strategy.
SEMICON Taiwan 2014
First annual Silicon Europe Taiwan Day, September 4, 2014 in Taipei
The European Economic and Trade Office (EETO), together with the European Business Regulatory Cooperation (EBRC) hosted a field of distinguished micro- and nanoelectronics experts from the European Commission and Members States at its first annual Silicon Europe Taiwan Day. The half-day event on the theme “Enhancing transnational and cross-continental innovation“, attended by around 110 representatives of European and Taiwanese industry and research entities, showcased insights on European excellence in the fields of micro- and nanoelectronics, presented European competitive clusters’ know-how, experience and innovations, such as “Silicon Europe”, as well as offered opportunities for direct B2B matchmaking. The forum was part of the EU’s efforts to enhance EU-Taiwan cooperation aimed at paving the way for sustainable engagement and cooperation between Europe and Taiwan. The experts shared presentations on the value of clusters in fostering innovation as well as research and innovation related to electronic components and systems in Europe and the strengths of European microelectronics.
The partners of the European clusters alliance Silicon Europe shared their expertise in disruptive innovation and technological development, cooperation within individual clusters and with European clusters, and called for international cooperation with Taiwan. The experts delivered a clear message that cooperation between industry, academia and administrations has been a key enabler in enhancing successful IT and micro- and nanoelectronics clusters in Europe. The European ecosystem for innovation is expected to be a good example for the development of Taiwanese high-tech clusters and future EU-Taiwan cooperation.
SEMICON Taiwan 2015
Fact Finding Mission & Silicon Europe – EBRC Workshop, September 1-3, 2015 in Taipei
From September 1-3, 2015, a Silicon Europe delegation visited Taiwan again. In addition to attending the Semicon Taiwan event, this mission proved to be the opportunity for the Silicon Europe delegation to meet representatives of the Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST), the Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA), several departments of the Industrial Technology and Research institute (ITRI), the Taiwan Semiconductor Association (TSIA) and the European Chamber of Commerce in Taiwan.
In collaboration with the EBRC (European Business and Regulatory Program), a workshop was organised during the Semicon Taiwan conference on the theme “Internet of Things as a driver for Semiconductors: beyond Moore”. Speakers from the different Silicon Europe countries gave presentations in front of a Taiwanese audience. The half-day event, which was attended by 70 people, brought together key industrial and institutional micro- and nanoelectronics players from Europe and Taiwan to share insights in the fields of micro- and nanoelectronics, present know-how, experience and innovations realized through industry clusters as well as to offer opportunities for direct business to business (B2B) matchmaking.
The Silicon Europe Alliance was explained and promoted. Several useful contacts were established and agreements for follow up have been made. As a result, matchmaking events for companies will be organised in Taiwan in 2016.
2nd Indo-German SME Forum in New Delhi, September 22-23, 2014 in New Dehli
The forum was about “cluster internationalisation” and provided a platform to foster linkages between public authorities, clusters, industry and other service providers from India and Germany. During this event, the Silicon Europe project was presented and looked for potential collaboration within the Silicon Europe context. Based on the knowledge we have gained through this event, India will have no priority for the internationalization strategy at this stage.
Implementation of the third country internationalisation strategy
The Silicon Europe partners used the opportunity of the call COS-CLUSTER_2014-3-03 – Cluster got international to submit a proposal with two other clusters in Greece and Italy. The proposal ESCiP “European Semiconductor Cluster Internationalisation Project” was accepted and will continue the collaboration with Taiwan. Besides Taiwan the US has been also selected as one of the priority regions outside of Europe.
Actions with other European MNE clusters
Since October 2011, twelve European Semiconductor Cluster organisations meet twice a year to share information and experiences from each cluster and to develop joint initiatives for cooperation.
• ME2C, FEEI (Austria)
• DSP Valley (Belgium)
• Minalogic, ARCSIS (France)
• Silicon Saxony (Germany)
• Corallia mi-Cluster (Greece)
• MIDAS (Ireland)
• Fondazione Distretto Green & High Tech Monza Brianza (Italy)
• High Tech NL, BCS (The Netherlands)
• NMI (UK)
As a complement to the Silicon Europe project, the European Semiconductor Cluster Forum (ESCF) improves the contacts between the European MNE clusters. The Silicon Europe cluster is the future of this Forum. In October 2015, four other clusters of this Forum joined the Silicon Europe Alliance, thus 10 MNE clusters of the ESCF are members of the Silicon Europe Alliance.
Joint Silicon Europe booth presentations
To promote Silicon Europe and the European micro- and nanoelectronics industry abroad joint booths at international fairs were organised. The Silicon Europe project was presented on the booth of Silicon Saxony during Semicon Europa in Dresden in October 2013. During the High-Tech Systems Conference in Den Bosch in May 2014, Silicon Europe was also present with a booth. Communication tools such as poster materials, as well as a “commercial and marketing flyer” were realised. This flyer, completed in April 2014, is dedicated to show a strong and comprehensive image of the European micro-and nanoelectronic industry outside the European border.
The Silicon Europe project was also shown, e. g. on the booth of Minalogic and Silicon Saxony during Semicon Europa in Grenoble in October 2014, on the booth of Silicon Saxony during Semicon Europa in Dresden in October 2015 and on the European pavilion during Semicon West in San Francisco in July 2014/15.
For improving links between the cluster members and for increasing partnership opportunities Silicon Europe cluster´ flagship events were opened to members from other clusters, e. g. DSP Valley Smart Systems Industry Summit in October 2014/15 or Silicon Saxony Day in July 2014/15.
3.2.4 Accompanying measures
In phase 3 (WP 5), accompanying measures took place in order to facilitate the implementation of the Joint Action Plan.
DSP Valley has developed the financial plan to support the execution of the Joint Action Plan. It has resulted in a directory of the local, regional, national and European funding sources and other support on themes addressed by the Silicon Europe Joint Action Plan (D5.1).
Several initiatives have been taken to propose new projects. Concrete opportunities have been pursued and project proposals have been written: e.g. COS-WP2014-4-05 - Erasmus for Young Entrepreneurs and COS-CLUSTER-2014-3-03 – Cluster Go International.
In addition to the search for funding opportunities for Silicon Europe activities, the Silicon Europe partners are also contributing to pre-existing or new funding programmes in the role of an interface for SMEs. Silicon Europe was instrumental in supporting PENTA, a recently endorsed Eureka Cluster that will replace CATRENE as a funding programme, capitalising on its strengths and offering remedies to its identified weaknesses (not least an insufficient SME involvement). The first PENTA call for project proposals is expected to open in first quarter 2016. Initially, the Cluster is scheduled to run for 5 years. Silicon Europe will contribute to ensuring a real SME involvement in the new programme through a Europe wide dissemination of the calls and to the creation of the aforementioned “market place’.
The successful implementation of the JAP will strongly depend on the mutual trust and willingness of the different cluster organisations to cooperate and implement the different actions but also on the trust of the cluster members in the proposed cross-regional activities. The best way to build trust among organisations is to gradually start implementing parts of an action plan. People will get to learn each other and each other´s organisation. Silicon Europe started with the implementation of some activities like opening up of regional events towards the members of the other clusters organisations or common presence on relevant international fairs.
An overview of initiatives have been taken to propose new projects and trust building activities is given in D5.2.
Table 6: Regional events opened towards the members of the other cluster organisations
Table 7: Common presence on international fairs
In order to be able to implement the actions defined in the JAP, it is important that all people from the participating cluster organisations who will be involved in those actions are well trained. Aspects such as international project management, participating to regional and European calls, internationalisation and joined training sessions should get attention.
On June 30th, 2015, a training session has been organised on the subject of Business in Taiwan. The trainer was Pascal Viaud, who is the local representative in Taiwan for the Invest in Grenoble/AEPI organisation. Unfortunately, due to unforeseen circumstances, the training had to be cancelled but might be implemented at a more convenient time later on after ending of Silicon Europe project.
On October 8th, 2015, a training session for cluster management has been organised on the subject cluster internationalisation and new roles of cluster managements in Dresden during Semicon Europa. This workshop was conducted by Dr. Gerd Meier zu Köcker, Head of European Cluster Observatory Team and main initiator of the European Cluster Excellence Initiative ECEI and founder of ESCA.
Within the COSME call "Cluster Excellence Programme" COS–WP 2014-3-04 a project proposal has been worked out to improve the cluster management excellence including further training activities of cluster (management) staff. The following topics for training have already been identified: Cluster Economics, Cluster Initiative Screening, Industry Analysis and Segmentation, Value Chain Analysis, Benchmarking and Internationalization of SMEs. The project proposal CLEXIM (Cluster excellence in micro- and nanoelectronic clusters) was submitted in June 2015.
Since October 2010, 12 European Semiconductor Clusters are meeting twice a year for sharing information from their clusters. The European Semiconductor Cluster Forum (ESCF) allows for the clusters to exchange details about their activities. It is as such offering a platform for exchanging best practices, exchanging ideas and learning about MNE outside the own region.
Staff exchange is also a measure to increase the competence level of people. Already from the start of the project it was decided to mutually invite the staff of the partners in the project to the “flagship” events of each cluster, in order to build-up the cooperation. This created the unique opportunities where the staff exchanged the experiences and learned on the best practices used in each cluster.
Table 8: Staff exchange related to clusters´ flagship events
The deliverable D5.3 represents the activities regarding joint training sessions and recruitment campaigns.
Companies can only be successful in case they can rely on a sufficient number of competent people. Recruitment activities will be organised on cross-regional level to increase the probability of finding the right people. Each cluster promotes vacancies of their cluster members to the whole of Silicon Europe.
The Silicon Europe partners have ongoing activities on recruitment based on the following activities:
- On-line vacancies: e.g. Silicon Europe members can post their vacancies on the cluster websites.
- Job fairs: On regional and international level, screening potential candidates and distribute their applications to the cluster members.
- Workshops: e.g. organising of workshops for international recruitment with focus on the requirements and modalities to be completed when employing a foreign candidate.
3.2.5 Promotion of visibility of EU clusters and of the utilization of MNE as KET
Communication and dissemination are being implemented throughout all phases of the project (WP 6). The main activities were focused on ensuring a consistent inside and outside project communication and dissemination. At the beginning of the project we set up a project website (D6.1 www.silicon-europe.eu) with extensive information about the project and the involved clusters.
All Silicon Europe publications and news were uploaded on the webpage www.silicon-europe.eu and were frequently updated by ourselves. Silicon Europe posted messages via Twitter regularly and has established a LinkedIn account.
A Silicon Europe presentation and event schedule (D6.2) were created and adapted to the current project progress regularly. We also published the Silicon Europe newsletter (D6.3) twice a year.
One part of our activities to ensuring a consistent outside project communication and dissemination are publications on press and other media (D6.4).
The publications on press focus on main activities like the start of the project in October 2012, the cluster meeting with the political representatives of the involved regions in February 2013 or the final Silicon Europe activities during Semicon Europa in October 2015. The project duration has been extended by one month as the final project activities have been taken place during Semicon Europa in October 2015.
For dissemination activities, different communication materials were prepared like a Silicon Europe brochure, a flyer especially for use beyond Europe, Silicon Europe stickers, Silicon Europe business cards, roll-up banners and the brochure A 5 Step Joint Action Plan. We also created an image video (D6.5 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3a1ja_ofSMk).
Figure 13: Silicon Europe brochures and flyer
For successful stakeholder involvement, the following dissemination events were organised by Silicon Europe.
In collaboration with the Saxon Ministry of Education and Research, a dissemination event with regional political representatives of the clusters was held in Brussels on February 20th, 2013. The political representatives talked on the future of microelectronics as a key enabling technology. Silicon Europe was presented and a joint Silicon Europe position paper was discussed as part of this talk. The Silicon Europe clusters´ joint statement was signed by representatives of the regional governments of Rhône-Alpes and Saxony during the follow-up meeting on February 13th, 2014 in Grenoble. It was also endorsed by the regional authorities of Carinthia. Of course, it carries the signatures of all triple helix clusters of Silicon Europe.
Figure 14: Silicon Europe Clusters´ Joint Statement
Successful involvement of European Commission
On October 1st, 2013 DG Connect, Directorate A unit Components has met with Silicon Europe on the implementation of the 'European Strategy for micro-and nanoelectronics components and systems in Brussels. During this meeting Silicon Europe was invited to give their vision and expectations on the European Strategy as presented on May 23rd, 2013 and to put forward their ability to contribute to the implementation of the strategy. The follow-up workshop of this meeting took place on November 28th, 2013 in Brussels. The regions of Saxony, Grenoble, the Southern region of Netherlands and the region Flanders made presentation of their approach to smart specialisation, the definition of the Partnership Agreement and in later stage the Operational Plans. DG Connect made a short presentation on the progress of the so-called combination of funding and how this could work in the future to support larger innovation/investment projects with a mix of H2020 and ESIF funds.
Successful involvement of representatives of industry, research and politics
Silicon Europe Policy Workshop on micro- and nanoelectronics and its role as key enabling technology
On November 5th, 2014, the partners of the project Silicon Europe discussed at the Saxon Liaison Office Brussels the challenges and opportunities with regards to reindustrialization of Europe that arise from micro- and nanoelectronics and its role as key enabling technology.
Representatives of the European Parliament as well as representatives of industry, research institutes and regional authorities gave an insight into their respective views.
The Semi industry in Europe is of strategic importance – chips are everywhere. MNE is essential for European leadership in future and emerging markets worldwide and is the enabler for all key areas such as mobility, health, energy efficiency, security and convenience. MNE is the enabler for “Smart Anything”.
Even though Europe is acting already, e.g. ECSEL program, the investments need to be accelerated and intensified to retain and increase the global competitiveness of MNE to compete with countries like China and US which have a huge programme of investment in MNE. In this respect, it was appealed mainly to economic players to have the courage to invest in MNE. The European industry needs visionaries to establish new big global players made in Europe.
With regards to the European strategy for Key Enabling Technologies it is essential to pursue consequently the approach already taken by the European Commission.
Besides investments in new development projects and pilot lines it is also important to make targeted investments in new talents as they are the workers of the future in modern fabs. In this context research institutes play an important role.
Figure 15: Impressions of Silicon Europe policy workshop
Final Silicon Europe project activities during Semicon Europa 2015 in Dresden
The final Silicon Europe conference in October 2015 consist of different activities:
• Final Steering Committee Meeting, Oct 5
• Press conference, Oct 6
• 9th European Semiconductor Cluster Forum (ESCF), Oct 6
• Public workshop, Oct 7
• VIP guided tours, Oct 6+7
• Taste of Silicon Europe booth event, Oct 7
• B2B matchmaking, Oct 6-8
Final Steering Committee Meeting, October 5th, 2015
During the Steering Committee Meeting, the Silicon Europe project was reviewed. Under the brand of Silicon Europe, the partnership will be continued after the end of the funded period of the project. Six new cluster members were approved and the new board was elected for the first two years (2016/2017). The new board consists of the Chairman Peter Simkens (DSP Valley) and the Vice-Chairwoman Isabelle Guillaume (Minalogic). According to the statute of the new Silicon Europe Alliance Peter Simkens and Isabelle Guillaume will switch their roles for the second year.
Silicon Europe press conference, October 6th, 2015
Press release: http://www.silicon-europe.eu/files/2015/10/MI_0215_SE_Press-release_6-Oct-2015_ENG.pdf
During the press conference, the Silicon Europe partners announced continuation of their collaboration after the end of the project, deepening and enlarging it into the Silicon Europe Alliance. Another six European clusters have joined the Silicon Europe Alliance. The cluster partners presented the step-by-step strategy for the time till 2018 (“Joining Forces for European Leadership for Innovative Electronics – A 5 Step Joint Action Plan”) to the media.
Figure 16: Impressions of Silicon Europe press conference on October 6th, 2015
9th European Semiconductor Cluster Forum (ESCF), October 6th, 2015
The current status of the Silicon Europe project, vision and future activities were discussed within the participating clusters. The decision was taken to combine ESCF with Silicon Europe due to the large overlap regarding the member basis, which was nearly the same after joining of the six new MNE clusters to Silicon Europe Alliance.
Public workshop, October 7th, 2015
“Workshop on the Role of the European Clusters and Regions in Electronic Components and Systems”
The workshop aimed to take stock, exchange views and consolidate relations with the relevant stakeholders. The workshop also discussed possible next steps which may include the organisation in 2016 of a high level meeting.
Reaching out to regions and clusters is part of the Industrial Strategy for the Electronics Industry in Europe. The workshop was built on ongoing initiatives in particular Silicon Europe and the European Semiconductor Cluster Forum (ESCF). Furthermore, it used the results of the smart specialisation workshop held in 2014 in Villach (Austria) and of the workshop held on April 29th, 2015 with the RTO’s in Brussels.
The workshop intended to respond to the stronger need for cooperation and coordination, networking and strengthening the eco-system with specific emphasis on the role of regions and clusters. In particular, the access to finance (including EFSI and ESIF) and smart specialisation were featured on the agenda.
At the workshop, Silicon Europe presented its Joint Action Plan and the impact achieved so far already. More than 50 participants attended the workshop.
The event was web streamed to follow it live (http://www.silicon-europe.eu/events/workshop-europaen-clusters).
The organisation of the workshop was done by DG CONNECT and Silicon Europe. The outcome is an action paper prepared by DG CONNECT. Recommendations for different levels are outlined in this paper.
Recommendation 1 – Internationalisation
• Europe should acquire better hands-on knowledge of Asian markets, which often drive demand and supply – accessing such markets is essential for the health of the European industry.
(Recommendation applicable to the European level)
• Europe should increase the visibility of the European electronic components and systems industry internationally, for example in Taiwan and the USA.
(Recommendation applicable to National and Regional levels)
• Europe needs to support the internationalisation of SMEs.
(Recommendation applicable to National and Regional levels)
• Europe should take advantage of our attractive innovation and cluster environment to attract talents and start-ups from elsewhere including Asia to Europe, leading to a more balanced collaboration.
(Recommendation applicable to National and Regional levels)
Recommendation 2 – Identifying and exploiting commercial and application/product opportunities
• Clarify the mapping of regional smart specialisation expertise, as carried out in the Eye@RIS3 mapping exercise, and introduce an application areas focus within regional smart specialisation strategies.
(Recommendation applicable to the European and Regional levels)
• Exploit the innovation expertise within existing cluster organisations, such as the Silicon Europe Alliance, to work with the regions to identify attractive commercial and product/applications development opportunities.
(Recommendation applicable to the Regional level)
Recommendation 3 – Financial support and state aid
• Prioritise the development of an IPCEI suited to effective exploitation and support of Europe’s micro- and nanoelectronics expertise and industrial infrastructure.
(Recommendation applicable to the European, National and Regional levels)
Figure 17: Impressions of final public workshop
The proceedings of public workshop are summarised in D6.6.
VIP guided tours, October 6+7th, 2015
Silicon Europe together with the City of Dresden organised two guided tours at Semicon Europa including a meeting with new Semi Europe President Laith Altimime. The representatives of the regions visited among others the Alleé de Cluster and selected Silicon Europe member companies. The Lord Mayor City of Dresden hosted a joint Public Authority Lunch with the following agenda points: Silicon Europe Alliance and Joint Action Plan, EU Project ESCIP and common potential activities.
Taste of Silicon Europe booth event, October 7th, 2015
The joint Silicon Europe event took place at the Allée des Clusters. Invited were all visitors and exhibitors of Semicon Europa to come to the Allée des Clusters. The whole Silicon Europe consortium and cluster members were represented. All clusters sponsored this event with regional food and beverages. For dissemination glasses with the Silicon Europe brand were created.
B2B matchmaking, October 6-8th, 2015
The organisation of the B2B matchmaking event was organized by Enterprise Europe Network (EEN) and Silicon Europe (https://www.b2match.eu/Semiconeu2015). In total 100 meetings have been arranged with participants from 22 countries.
Further dissemination events and booths presentations
Silicon Europe presentations were given at various events. Some examples of dissemination events are, e.g.:
• European Semiconductor Cluster Forum (ESCF) twice a year
• Silicon Europe session at DATE Conference in Grenoble, March 2013
• Silicon Europe presentation at INC9 Conference in Berlin, May 2013
• Silicon Europe European Commission Tour, March 2015
• Semicon Japan in Tokyo, December 2014
• Smart Specialisation Conference in Villach, May 2014
• Catrene Workshop in Grenoble, June 2014
• Launch of the European Smart Anything Everywhere Initiative in Grenoble, March 2015
• European Conference On Digital And Key Enabling Technologies Skills, June 2015
Silicon Europe booth has been organised at the following events, e.g.
• High Tech Systems Conference in Den Bosch, May 2014 and March 2015
• Silicon Saxony Day in Dresden, July 2014 and 2015
• Semicon Europa, Oct 2014 in Grenoble and Oct 2012/2013 /2015 in Dresden
• Smart Systems Industry Summit in Mechelen, Oct 2013, 2014 and 2015
A strong Silicon Europe brand was created within the project. It is the brand under which the leading micro- and nanoelectronics clusters in Europe collaborate to represent, support and promote the companies and organisations belonging to their eco-system both on European and global level. The brand was registered in the trademark register in August 2015.
3.2.6 Definition of a European meta-cluster for MNE
A strong Silicon Europe brand was created within the project. It is the brand under which the leading micro- and nanoelectronics clusters in Europe collaborate to represent, support and promote the companies and organisations belonging to their eco-system both on European and global level. The brand was registered in the trademark register in August 2015.
Figure 18: Silicon Europe brand
The story line from the beginning of the project “Silicon Europe – The leaders for energy efficient ICT” was changed in “Silicon Europe – The leaders for innovative electronics”. After several discussions with the consortium, the decision was made to leave the narrow focus to address a wider technological field.
A joint vision mission statement was agreed by all partners.
Objectives of the meta-cluster:
Figure 19: Vision of Silicon Europe
Figure 20: Mission statement of Silicon Europe
The Silicon Europe partners have set up a Statute for a formal cooperation under the brand of Silicon Europe after the end of the funded period of the project. This also includes an opening towards clusters beyond the initial project partnership.
The new Silicon Europe Alliance, the continuation of the strong cooperation beyond the timeframe of the project, was announced at the Silicon Europe press conference during Semicon Europa in Dresden in October 2015.
The new board of the alliance consists of the Chairman Peter Simkens (DSP Valley) and the Vice-Chairwoman Isabelle Guillaume (Minalogic). According to the statute of the new Silicon Europe Alliance Peter Simkens and Isabelle Guillaume will switch their roles for the second year. The partners of the Silicon Europe Alliance are committed to implement the agreed Joint Action Plan by signing the Silicon Europe Statute.
3.2.7 Enlarging the Silicon Europe partnership
One main focus of the project was to enlarge the basis, both geographically and technologically. Already during the timeframe of the project two further clusters have joined the project as associated partners.
• Business Cluster Semiconductors (BSC), The Netherlands
• ME2C, Austria
The associated partners have contributed to all phases of the project, but without getting any money from the grant.
From 2012 to 2015, the number of members from the participating clusters has also increased.
Table 9: Growths number of members from the clusters
The cross-regional cooperation will be continued after the end of the funded period. Six new cluster members have joined the Silicon Europe Alliance in October 2015.
• Distretto Green & High Tech (Italy)
• MIDAS (Ireland)
• GAIA (Spain)
• NMI (UK)
• mi-Cluster (Greece)
• SCS Cluster (France)
Now the Silicon Europe Alliance unites 12 European micro- and nanoelectronics clusters with about 2,000 cluster partners.
Two of new cluster members (Greece, Italy) are already partners of the project “ESCiP “European Semiconductor Cluster Internationalisation Project”.
3.2.8 Initialisation of business at member level
Besides the partners of Silicon Europe, the members of the participating clusters have also benefited from the Silicon Europe project as shown in the following examples.
Sofics (Belgium)
Sofics has developed new business thanks to exhibition participation with DSP Valley. Bart Keppens, Marketing Director Sofics: "Sofics joined the DSP Valley delegation for the 2014 Silicon Saxony Day, the annual meeting point for the high-tech industry, science, research and public institutions of Saxony. During the event we discussed a cooperation with Creative Chips (locations in Bingen and Dresden) for an ASIC development in advanced CMOS technology. This has led to a real contract 1.5 month after the Silicon Saxony Day. Sofics delivered customized on-Chip ESD protection clamps. A new cooperation is currently being discussed for an automotive electronics application.”
Dolphin-Integration (France)
Jean-François POLLET | VP Business Development: “Dolphin participated in the B2B event organized by DSP Valley in June 2015, alongside 3 other Minalogic companies. The outcome of this participation was positive. We found a partner whose expertise was complementary to ours, and jointly submitted a bid for a call for tender which we won! The whole thing happened very quickly after our encounter that day. It is a small project but small streams become great driver! We also met a potentially interesting Dutch partner. We do enjoy these B2B events.”
SOITEC (France)
Nelly Kernevez | Partnership director: “Thanks to Silicon Europe, SOITEC:
− promoted its SOI technologies at an event organized by Silicon Europe in Brussels in November 2014 with key policy-makers.
− was able to organize with the SOI consortium[1] a SOI workshop at the Silicon Saxony Day in Dresden in July 2015 which gathered 50 participants interested by the high level panellists composed of representatives of the industry (IFX,ST, GF, NXP), universities (UCL) and the European Commission (ECSEL).
These events allowed us to highlight the strong competitive advantage that SOI represents for the European microelectronics’ industry and its innovative applications (automotive, lightning, consumer...). It was all the more important in the context of GLOBALFOUNDRIES’ engagement in FDSOI22, to explain the importance that the technology has for industry in Europe.”
3.3 Success indicators
Within the specific objectives of Silicon Europe (see chapter 2), the following success indicators were defined.
To 1) Promotion of micro- and nanoelectronics
Success indicators (target figures):
• Number of visitors of web platform(s) (including web 2.0 components) (100.000): achieved 31019
• Number of articles in various media (newspapers, CORDIS, etc.) (50): achieved 39
To 2) Securing European know-how for Europe
Success indicators (target figures):
• Number of defined common research topics between the clusters to work on (synergies) (15): achieved 18
o Health Care and Ageing Society
o Energy Efficiency
o Automotive and Transport
o Equipment
o Materials and Manufacturing
o Semiconductor Process and Integration
o Internet of things
o Design Technologies
o Process development
o Communications and Digital Lifestyle
o embedded sensor technologies for security and safety
o Electro mobility
o Smart Systems Integration
o Agriculture
o Advanced computing
o Atomic and Molecular Scale Devices and Systems
o Robotics, Cognitive Systems & Smart Spaces
o Fully Depleted Silicon on Insulator technology (FDSOI)
• Number of Partnership agreements between institutions from the clusters within the cluster (complementarities/synergies) (20): achieved Silicon Europe clusters´ joint statement
o The clusters and regional representatives signed the Silicon Europe clusters´ joint statement. This joint statement was also agreed with key cluster members and can be also considered as a kind of partnership agreement between institutions.
• Number of common R&D projects initiated (synergies + complementarities) (10): achieved 131
To 3) Opening up new markets
Success indicators (target figures):
• Number of partnership agreements between institutions from the clusters and other institutions outside the cluster (5): achieved 6
o Zelenograd – Silicon Saxony
o Zelenograd – Minalogic
o Minalogic – Taiwan
o Silicon Europe – BCS NL (associated partner)
o Silicon Europe – ME2C (associated partner)
o Silicon Europe - Korea
• Number of publications/presentations under the common identity (10): achieved 68
Potential Impact:
4 Potential impact
Micro- and nanoelectronics will make a significant contribution to the successful handling of the mega trends including e.g. climate protection, a society that is shifting from industry to knowledge, the globalisation and optical, energy and environmental technologies. Silicon Europe’s efforts in micro- and nanoelectronics significantly contribute to Europe’s economic and innovative strength – both in the short and the long term. In the short term, micro- and nanoelectronics help traditional industries to open up new markets and their utilisation will lead to the increase of energy efficiency in all sectors. Furthermore, Silicon Europe completes and strengthens the value chain of Europeans semiconductor eco-system will be a role model for inter-cluster cooperation. Ultimately, the European semiconductor industry will be boosted and thus enabled to take on the Asian and global challenge on the market. The Silicon Europe initiative will raise the awareness of the importance of the European semiconductor industry in the wider public and authorities. The capacity to generate innovations and successfully transfer them to the market is a key skill for Europe. This innovative force is decisive for the competitiveness and therefore ultimately for Europe’s sustainability.
4.1 Expected impact from the Joint Action Plan
The Joint Action Plan is the major outcome of the Silicon Europe project. It describes the agreed actions of the Silicon Europe cluster alliance for the next 3 years (2016-2018) resulting in multiple notable impacts on different levels.
4.1.1 Impact on cluster level
The successful implementation of the Silicon Europe JAP will have a clear impact on the cluster organisations itself. Specifically, it will lead to an increase of quality in management, mainly by improving their management practices as well as their market/competitive advantages or value-chain analytical capacities and by enabling them to provide top quality services to their SMEs, especially on facilitating SMEs internationalisation, better exploiting and diffusing Key Enabling Technologies (KETs), in particular of course micro- and nanoelectronics.
Consequently, on the level of the cluster itself, i.e. on member level, this will lead to an increase of international collaboration and innovation, both within Europe as well as beyond Europe. It is expected, that at least 40% of all member companies will be engaged in such activities, thereby clearly exceeding the respective benchmark on European level (25%).
4.1.2 Impact on regional level
On the level of the regions involved, the implementation of the JAP will lead to an effective implementation of smart specialisation strategies, in particular by fostering interregional exchange of best practices.
The respective commitment has already be shown by the involved regions by forming the Vanguard initiative. These regions wish to build the synergies and complementarities in smart specialisation strategies to boost world-class clusters and cluster networks, in particular through pilots and large scale demonstrators. These investments will bolster the competitive capacity of Europe to lead in new industries for the future and develop lead-markets that offer solutions for our common challenges. The impact of Silicon Europe activities will mainly be on the SME level in this regard. Consequently, this will lead to growth of companies and employment in the participating regions. Silicon Europe is well known at local level of the participating clusters and thus able to influence policy. The regional clusters also gained more visibility due to the high level of awareness of the project.
4.1.3 Impact on European level
The implementation of the Silicon Europe activities will have a clear contribution on several technical roadmaps related to micro- and nanoelectronics, but also application areas, such as the ECSEL MASRIA or the VMS (Vision, Mission strategy) documents by EPOSS, ARTEMIS and ENIAC respectively, in particular with regard to the effective and efficient involvement of SMEs in an international project context.
The founders already prove their capacity to contribute to such an ambitious issue by actively supporting the design of a new SME friendly funding programme in the framework of EUREKA (PENTA). The Silicon Europe activities will also have a strong impact on securing proper access to finance for SMEs, both from public as well as private sources. Consequently, activities will also have an impact on participation rate of SMEs in major funding programmes related to innovation such as Horizon2020.
With regard to the implementation plan proposed by the Electronics Leaders Group the Silicon Europe activities will clearly contribute to the facilitation of the creation of the demanded world-class reference zones (4.4) as well as to realisation of the requested network of excellence centres (4.5).
The Silicon Europe partners have already launched cooperation approaches towards different clusters, e.g. in the framework of the Competitiveness and Innovation Framework Programme (CIP). A successful implementation of the JAP will further contribute to successful cross-cluster cooperation’s, also using cross-sectoral approaches, thereby fully leveraging the opportunities that arise from micro- and nanoelectronics being a key enabling technology.
Silicon Europe assured recognition at European level for the roles that cluster carry out in terms of acting as intermediary between SMEs, large companies, research institutes and politics.
4.1.4 Impact on global level
Micro- and nanoelectronics are impacting the full European value chain with 30B€ contribution to Europe GDP. MNE is one of the few industries creating jobs, is driving 90% of the innovation, is positioning Europe as worldwide leader in R&D, is networking worldwide leading companies and numerous SME’s, is integrating R&D and Manufacturing within clusters and is providing societal solutions via new technologies and applications.
Silicon Europe activities will first and foremost lead to a further increase of visibility/attractiveness of Europe as a relevant area for micro- and nanoelectronics, mainly by forming the critical mass and further increasing and exploiting the brand value of Silicon Europe as such.
This will directly impact the market valorisation of micro- and nanoelectronics as key enabling technology in traditional industry. E.g. Semiconductors provide the knowledge and technologies that generate some 10% of global GDP.
Of course micro- and nanoelectronics will be essential for making the Internet of Things (IoT) work as well and, even more important to ensure a leading position of Europe within this field.
Improving energy efficiency is a priority in all decarbonisation scenarios and thus also one of the major challenges with regard to the flagship initiative of ‘a resource efficient Europe’. The improvements in R&D in the field of micro- and nanoelectronics, but also the increased utilisation as effect of the increased awareness will have a major impact on energy efficiency.
In the Silicon Europe cluster, the value chain of micro- and nanoelectronics is extensively represented. All Silicon Europe partners together have strengths along the whole semiconductor value chain. Micro- and nanoelectronics require a close proximity between research, technological development and production. A migration of research and development consequently results in a migration of the production and vice versa. The strong collaboration within Silicon Europe has also an impact on strengthening and completing the value chain of the Semicon Europe eco-system.
The availability of a complete European semiconductor value chain is the key factor for an ability to compete globally. Without semiconductors, equipment and the know-how regarding material processing for production, none of the traditional or emerging industries such as automotive, aerospace, energy, telecommunication, and medical equipment, will remain competitive in the future. The Silicon Europe cluster will prevent Europe from losing its ability to develop and produce advanced semiconductors. Thus, the risk of producers of competitive technology products with “embedded intelligence” migrating to Asia and the dependence that comes with a foreign supply is reduced. The coordinated actions of all Silicon Europe cluster partners will provide the basis for an application-oriented research and development work with a pan-European focus. This is even more important since not a single European county can cope with the challenges posed by the growing international competition.
Silicon Europe developed a vision of indispensability for the European semiconductor industry. This leads to a significant improvement of the public awareness of the role of MNE regarding its economic (Europe´s competitiveness), scientific (securing of the production know-how for KET-relevant technologies) and social (coping with global megatrends) relevance for Europe´s future.
4.1.5 Potential impact on megatrends
Micro- and nanoelectronics is a key enabling technology which permeates through all industry and society as a whole and have a major impact on nearly every megatrend. Changes of the global ecosystem have a direct impact and are closely linked to economic, social and technical trends.
1) Impact on biosphere megatrends
Availability of resources
Raw materials, metals and fossil fuels in particular, are the basic elements of our technological live. They are not in unlimited supply on Earth.
Environmental protection, climate protection and sustainability
Global environmental pollution has further increased during the last few years despite all efforts to contain it. Only the rapidly increasing use of information and communication technology (ICT) systems has reached the CO2 emission levels of all combined civil air traffic and the energy costs for operating ICT infrastructures have become a significant financial concern.
2) Impact on social megatrends
Demographic development and social structure
Social structures are breaking up and flexibility and mobility are becoming more significant. The world´s population has been growing at an exponential rat since industrialisation began. The increasing aging of society will be especially noticeable in Europe. The demand for services in wellness, sports and culture will rise in particular. The need for professional care in nursing homes or mobile nursing services will increase significantly. The advancing technologisation and networking of the world means that people without broadband internet access are falling further behind. This phenomenon is called the digital divide and mainly affects consumption, services, communication and culture. The gap between high and low incomes is becoming greater, the number of people with incomes in between is decreasing, are further trends with an need to avoid the digital divide for all of them.
Education, knowledge and work Society is shifting from industry towards knowledge.
The new type of work in the knowledge society is constantly searching for new real and virtual workplaces. Independent creative professionals and knowledge workers who previously worked from home will have joint platforms for networking, innovation and production. They will work with fixed and flexible workstations, wireless LAN, conference and telephone rooms.
Urbanisation
In the future, 70% of people will live in cities. The cities must be built in a vertical direction in order to ensure “walkability” – pedestrian friendliness with short distances despite the increased individual space requirement. Also the trend for recentralized cities with minimal distance between work, living accommodation and leisure activities are reducing energy and space consumption, commuter flows and traffic volumes.
Mobility
The importance of mobility will continue to increase. Geographical mobility will remain an important aspect, which will be reflected in the unchanged desire for personal mobility. These will be based on new services and simple ticketing for local public transport that will not only allow smooth transitions within the system, but also easy changes from and to personal transportation systems. The quality of public transportation will be improved with simple and electronic ticketing solutions, real time information and increased travelling comfort in new, modern vehicles. A shortage of energy will make a physical mobility more and more of a luxury. Information and communication technology provides the required means of exchanging information via the internet. Telepresence and holographic systems which bring business partners together will be part of our normal life.
3) Impact on economic megatrends
Globalisation
The world will become a global village resulting in the formation of a multipolar world order and new international organizations. This takes place across national borders in a global economy managed with modern information and communication technology. This strong, technological world has a great thirst for energy.
Markets, customers and consumption
Consumption will be influenced by three trends in the coming years: The developing countries share in prosperity, the growing demands for luxury, particularly in the boom countries China, India, Russia and Brazil, and sustained consumption in the West. These trends will result in the development of new consumer markets with rapid distribution of product ranges and high growth rates in emerging markets. The time of mass production is over in the old world with its extremely well developed markets. The development here is toward individual products, specific services and high level of diversification. In shops, all product information will be stored on electronic labels, so that customers only have to pass an electronic barrier with their shopping cart and pay with card. Capturing, tracking and analysing of information in the supply chain are direct linked with efficient information and communication systems.
4) Impact on technological megatrends
Medicine and health
The divisions between individual scientific and technical disciplines are becoming increasingly blurred. New processes, products and systems with improved characteristics and functions can be created by combining different disciplines. Medical developments are characterized by a high level of technologisation with the aim of developing new diagnostic methods and therapies, optimizing health care for any aging population, and reducing costs. Electronic health cards with an intelligent information technology will be the basis for modern medicine monitoring.
Optical technologies
Next generation optical technologies like future generations of computer chips, transmission of extremely large data volumes via fiber optic cables and even display technology in everyday life and consumer electronics are strongly linked to micro- and nanoelectronic. All these modern and next generation OLED, organic LED displays, active displays in cell phones are driven by micro- and nanoelectronic devices.
Energy and environmental technology
One of the greatest challenges is the coverage of global energy requirements while preserving the environment. The use of solar energy supplemented effectively by other regenerative energies, along with hydropower, biomass and geothermal energy, wind power promises the highest growth rates. To manage this energies in order to serve the energy demand in real time, challenges the development of so called smart grids. These smart grids will be controlled and managed by monitoring systems, based on software and micro- and nanoelectronics.
Manufacturing and process technology
High quality, low costs, the ability to manufacture customer specific products while preserving the environment. A main focus in industrial manufacturing and process technology is energy efficiency. One of the hand, energy efficiency can directly reduce costs. On the other hand, efficient and environmentally-friendly measures are a quality feature especially in the energy-intensive manufacturing sector that can be marketed well against the background of current discussions on environmental protection. The future goals like the robotic sector, the man-machine interface, the collaboration between humans and machines as “colleagues”, the “digital factory”, the electronic systems, optics and sensors needed for the optimization of manufacturing processes are using modern information technology and micro- and nanoelectronics.
Digitalisation
An important aspect of digitalisation being worked on is data storage. Future data storages could be a combination of micro- and nanoelectronic technologies with durable storage media such as crystals, a combination of laser and microfilming or holography.
Information and communication technology
In the future, humans will talk to humans and objects, and objects will even talk with objects. In fact, objects are becoming ever more intelligent and can interlink with each other. The goal is to publish and share knowledge within a company so that all employees can be involved to a larger degree. This leads to increase transparency, commitment, responsibility and satisfaction. At the same time, efficiency can be increased since colleagues can contribute information and ideas that nobody would have thought of. Other trends will be remote control households via the internet, cars will exchange information with cars or the environment, 3-D television, smart textiles and quantum cryptography to secure the continuously increasing data flows. This future communication will be mainly realised with electronic mobile communication equipment based on micro- and nanoelectronic units.
Integrated, miniaturized systems
In the future, computers will enter every sphere of life. This development is described as pervasive computing. The basis for pervasive computing is the miniaturization of micro- and nanoelectronic components such as processors and sensors. These embedded systems can interlink and communicate with each other or communicate with humans. A major benefit of all these integrated systems is that they operate invisibly and unnoticeably and thus improve comfort, safety, health and therefore the quality of life of users.
4.1.6 Benefits for stakeholders
The benefits, or impact of the various activities by Silicon Europe will influence many different “stakeholders” and each stakeholder will be affected in a different way.
The most obvious stakeholder is of course the group of businesses, in particular the SMEs, in the combined clusters. They will gain easier access to knowledge and technology that previously was difficult to access combined with access to key infrastructures in the Silicon Europe regions, e.g. pilot plants, living labs, field labs etc.. Due to the enlarged meta-size of the cluster collaboration, new markets will be available and many more potential partners are at hand. A significantly raised profile will further contribute to easier establishment of business contacts. A strong focus will be put on bringing large groups closer to new SMEs and targeted connections will give rise to new technological and business relations.
Through the enlargement of the regional ecosystems to the pan-European ecosystem companies belonging to the regional cluster can have easier access to a larger network and can be easier involved in international activities to detect and generate more business opportunities.
The other significant population of the cluster are the RTOs institutes and academia. Within the combined cluster environment they will have more opportunities to support businesses but they will also have more opportunities for collaboration with peer institutes which will render a significantly higher level of innovative knowledge in a smart specialisation context. Technology transfer to SMEs through industrial contracts will also be facilitated.
Then there are of course the cluster organisations themselves. Being a partner in a world renowned collaboration will automatically lead to a significantly raised profile. Even more important, the larger pool of partners in the collaboration will give much better opportunities to support the members in the own regional cluster. Finally, playing in the premier league, automatically benchmarks the clusters’ performance leading to rapid and continuous improvement of all participating clusters.
Of course there are regional and national benefits resulting from the cluster collaboration. Increased competitiveness and export performance by key businesses is of great regional and national importance as it will give increased access to potential inward investors and an increased level of external funding utilised by the region and member state. Therefore the impact on growth of SMEs and on employment will also be mentioned.
Equity providers will benefit from the cluster collaboration through access to more possibilities to support business establishment and growth. The cluster organisations will be instrumental in bringing innovative businesses and equity providers together and supporting them in the creation of effective relations.
The cluster collaboration will be in an excellent position to provide input to the regional, national and European policy-makers that will enable them to engineer innovation and economic growth policies that are tailored to the needs of the European micro- and nanoelectronics community at large. In this context, a better understanding of the framework conditions needed by cluster organisations and their members to operate more effectively internationally is of importance as is the way to support growth of local companies possibly through investment in the local ecosystems (in a harmonised way, on a European level). Also the improved international visibility of the local ecosystems is of benefit to the policy makers in their internationalisation efforts.
End users, the parties that will enjoy the fruits of the enforced European micro- and nanoelectronics business, will find better responses to their needs due to closer continental contact between the end user and the product/technology providers that will use the MNE innovations.
Furthermore, clusters, but in particular the Silicon Europe meta-cluster collaboration, has the potential to have an indirect effect on society as a whole due to MNE’s permeation in our daily lives.
4.1.7 Assessment of the impact for each strategic theme of the JAP
For assessment of the impact for each strategic theme of the Joint Action Plan a quantitative approach has been set up and several key performance indicators were defined.
Theme 1: Knowledge and technology transfer
Cross-regional availability of knowledge and technology throughout Europe will ensure that capitalisation of the knowledge will be stretched to the maximum as no opportunity will be left aside to use the knowledge and consequent technology. How various parties will benefit from the knowledge and technology transfer effort by Silicon Europe is presented in the introduction of this chapter.
Table 10: KPI´s of knowledge and technology transfer
Theme 2: Smart specialisation
A sound Smart Specialisation implementation will provide:
• Increased cross-cluster cooperation along interregional extended value chains
• Through a continuous exchange of experiences within the Silicon Europe consortium, lessons learned will be distributed between the Silicon Europe regions on a regular basis. This will help to implement the Smart Specialisation strategies both effectively and efficiently.
• Increased alignment of regional and cross-regional projects with the individual regional Smart Specialisation strategies and therefore increased combination of H2020 and ERDF funds.
Particular to Smart Specialisation the following Key Performance Indicators (KPI’s) will give insight in the success of the chosen approaches:
Table 11: KPI´s of smart specialisation
Theme 3: SME funding
The Silicon Europe partners, as cluster organisations, play a crucial role in understanding SMEs’ needs, being their voice at local, regional, national and European levels and supporting them in having easier access to public & private funds, needed to generate business- and technological partnerships’ opportunities.
Table 12: KPI´s of SME funding
Theme 4: International business development
Today, the micro- and nanoelectronics industry is a global industry. Many of the MNE companies, whether LE or SME are part of a global value chain. This means that, in particular for high tech clusters, competition takes place not on a regional nor on a national level but on a global level. Therefore, international business development has become increasingly important to improve the competitiveness of enterprises of all sizes.
Table 13: KPI´s of international business development
Theme 5: Promotion of micro- and nanoelectronics
Efficient communication and information exchange is a key issue to link the involved clusters to public and political actors. The sustainable strengthening of the brand “Silicon Europe” and speaking with one voice in- and outside of Europe help to attract the different stakeholder groups, which benefit from promoting MNE technology will be of great benefit.
Table 14: KPI´s of promotion of MNE
4.2 Main dissemination activities and exploitations of results
Silicon Europe disseminated all results of the project by selecting the appropriate modes of communication to address the relevant stakeholders. The key messages of Silicon Europa were agreed by all partners and are summarised in the joint vision mission statement (see chapter 3.2.6). The stakeholder were invited to take part in various events to discuss the results and to provide them with relevant information. Flyers were developed to disseminate the project results. Several dissemination activities like e.g. workshops, joint booths and B2B matchmaking events have been organised (some of them in co-operation with SEMI and EEN). There were also various publications in newspapers and other medias to reach the stakeholders like industry, research and also the civil society. The publications focus on main activities like e.g. the start of the project in October 2012, the dissemination event with regional political representatives in February 2013, or the final Silicon Europe activities during Semicon Europa in October 2015.
The main dissemination activities dedicated to different target groups were:
• Creation of project website www.sillicon-europe.eu
− Main target group: civil society, scientific community, industry, policy makers, medias
− Extensive information about the project and the participating cluster including upload of Silicon Europe news and publications
• Creation of Silicon Europe image video
− Main target group: civil society, scientific community, industry, policy makers, medias
− Short video about the Silicon Europe clusters and
• Dissemination event with regional political representatives, February 20th, 2013 in Brussels
− Main target group: policy makers
− Discussion with regional representatives about the future of MNE
• Silicon Europe Clusters´ Joint Statement
− Main target group: policy makers, industry, scientific community
− Silicon Europe position paper signed by representatives of the regional governments (Rhône-Alpes, Saxony, Carinthia)
• Meeting with DG CONNECT, October 1st, 2013 in Brussels
− Main target group: policy makers
− The meeting was about the implementation of the 'European Strategy for micro-and nanoelectronics components and systems' with discussion about how Silicon Europe could contribute to the strategy and what smart specialisation could add.
• Policy Workshop November 5th, 2014 in Brussels
− Main target group: policy makers, industry, research
− Workshop on micro- and nanoelectronics and its role as key enabling technology with the support of SEMI
− Discussion on challenges and opportunities with regards to reindustrialisation of Europe
• Press Conference, October 8th, 2012 in Dresden
− Main target group: medias
− Announcing of the project start and building first relationship with the medias
• Press Conference October 6th, 2015 in Dresden
− Main target group: medias
− Publishing of the Joint Action Plan, announcement of new Silicon Europe Alliance with new board and enlarging the partnership by 6 new members after the end of the project
• Workshop European Clusters and Regions, October 7th, 2015 in Dresden
− Main target group: policy makers, industry, research
− Workshop on the role of the European clusters and regions in electronic components and systems organised by DG CONNECT and Silicon Europe
• 1st Silicon Europe Taiwan Day, September 4th, 2014 in Taipei
− Main target group: industry, research
− Half-day event during SEMICON Taiwan on enhancing transnational and cross-continental innovation presenting European competitive clusters’ know-how, experience and innovations related to electronic components and systems in Europe and the strengths of European MNE
− Organised by EBRC together with Silicon Europe
• 2nd Silicon Europe Taiwan Day, September 3rd, 2015 in Taipei
− Main target group: industry, research
− Half-day event during SEMICON Taiwan bringing together key industrial and institutional MNE players in Europe and Taiwan
It is very important to exploit the results also beyond the duration of the project. Therefore, follow up activities were already defined, e. g. participating at the following events:
− DSP Valley B2B Forum, June 2016, Leuven
− Silicon Saxony Day, July 2016, Dresden
− Semicon Taiwan, September 2016, Taipei
− Semicon Europa, October 2016, Grenoble
− Smart Systems Industry Summit, October 2016, Mechelen
Additional, a Steering Committee Meeting is scheduled for the 1st quarter of 2016. The kick off meeting of the ESCiP project will be held on 21st January in Athens.
List of Websites:
www.silicon-europe.eu
1 Executive Summary
Micro- and nanoelectronics (MNE) are essential for the prosperity of Europe: Micro- and nanoelectronics are everywhere. Without this technology, we would have no computers, mobile phones, household appliances or motor vehicles. Further down the value chain, electronic components also contribute to the improvement of manufacturing processes and thereby enable new technologies to evolve. Micro-and nanoelectronics are a key driver for innovation in almost all sectors and industrial fields. The European Commission, by designating micro- and nanoelectronics as one of Europe’s Key Enabling Technologies, acknowledges the importance of the sector for the development of industry in Europe as well as for the future prosperity of the entire continent.
As a Key Enabling Technology, micro- and nanoelectronics, including the use and production of semiconductors, are essential for all goods and services, which need intelligent control and communication. This applies to sectors as diverse as transportation, health, security and energy. To counteract the increased global demand for energy and to avoid undesirable environmental consequences, more intelligent and efficient management of conventional fuels and their utilization is necessary and this is where micro- and nanoelectronics become indispensable.
Silicon Europe is the brand under which the leading micro- and nanoelectronics (MNE) clusters in Europe collaborate to represent, support and promote the companies and organisations belonging to their ecosystem both on European and global level. Silicon Europe acts as intermediary between all the relevant partners from research and academia, public authorities and the industry. Within the project, six world-class clusters from five leading micro- and nanoelectronics regions have collaborated to create an open European collaborative platform to strengthen the leading role of the European semiconductor industry in the global economy and value chain. Based on that work, the members of Silicon Europe have a three-year experience in successful collaboration within the cross regional ecosystem facilitating cross regional partnerships and business relations.
The major outcome of the project is the Joint Action Plan, a step-by-step strategy for the time till 2018. It describes the agreed actions to be taken by the Silicon Europe meta-cluster in order to complete the goal of the project: “make Europe the world leader in innovative electronics”. The cluster partners identified five strategic themes that need to be addressed in order to strengthen Europe´s competitiveness. The decision was taken to continue the strong cooperation beyond the timeframe of the project, as an association welcoming other European micro- and nanoelectronics clusters and further deepening the partnership to implement the Joint Action Plan. Another six European clusters have joined the Silicon Europe Alliance in October 2015. The new members enlarge the Silicon Europe partnership both geographically and technologically. Now the Silicon Europe Alliance unites 12 European micro- and nanoelectronics clusters with about 2,000 cluster partners.
Project Context and Objectives:
2 Project context and objectives
Five of the leading European micro- and nanoelectronics regions have joined their research, development and production expertise to form the transnational, research-driven cluster “Silicon Europe – The Leaders for Innovative Electronics”. The cluster partners include national consortia that all have established structures for the close cooperation of research, business and the authorities (“triple helix”). Within the triple-helix consortia are the following six strong MNE cluster:
•Silicon Saxony (Dresden, Saxony, Germany)
•Minalogic (Grenoble, Rhône-Alpes, France)
• DSP Valley (Leuven, Flanders, Belgium)
• High Tech NL (Eindhoven, South and East Netherlands, The Netherlands)
• Business Cluster Semiconductors (Nijmegen, The Netherlands) as associated partner
• ME2C (Villach, Carinthia, Austria) as associated partner
The partners of Silicon Europe are linked by a common goal: to secure Europe its position as the world’s leading centre for innovative electronics. While aiming to reach this main goal, Silicon Europe will make substantial contributions toward realizing several partial goals that will be of crucial importance for Europe´s future economy (regarding Europe´s competitiveness), science (regarding the securing of know-how for the manufacturing of KET-relevant technologies) and society (regarding solutions for global mega trends).
Within the project, the six world-class clusters from the five leading micro- and nanoelectronics regions have collaborated to create an open European collaborative platform to strengthen the leading role of the European semiconductor industry in the global economy and value chain.
Silicon Europe will intensify the transnational collaboration between the regional research-oriented competence clusters and will make a substantial contribution to the “Europe 2020” agenda, an economic program initiated by the European Union. The program’s focus is the advancement of research and development (R&D). This includes the development of environmentally friendly technologies as well as activities to secure consistent economic growth. The Silicon Europe partners bring together their know-how and concentrate on realizing the two flagship initiatives “Resource Efficient Europe” and “Digital Agenda”. The results of the Silicon Europe collaboration will produce an additional positive effect on the “Industry Politics in the era of Globalization” as well as the “Agenda for new Capabilities and Employment”.
The specific objectives of Silicon Europe are:
1) Promotion of micro- and nanoelectronics as Key Enabling Technology for the traditional industry, unlocking new solutions for the major societal challenge on energy efficiency. This promotion will be supported by the development of a new communication concept on the strategic importance of micro- and nanoelectronics.
2) Securing European know-how for Europe: Using inter-cluster synergies and complementarities
a. with research institutes and universities, for access to the newest technologies and to highly qualified competencies and staff,
b. with fabless design houses for the development of new functionalities and/or architectures for the micro- and nanoelectronics,
c. and with value adding system integrators for the market valorisation.
3) Opening up new markets and boosting competitiveness especially of SMEs by improving innovation and technology transfer from research to market, and by developing an internationalization strategy inside and outside Europe, supported by the creation of a common identity for a (virtual) European semiconductor cluster.
Problem description – The need for resource and energy efficiency
Due to the emergence of developing and transitioning countries - particularly China and India - and the resulting rise in living standards of the population, world energy demand is dramatically increasing. All scenarios within the “Energy Roadmap to 2050” show electricity will have to play a much greater role than now and will have to contribute to the decarbonisation of transport and heating/cooling. Electricity could provide around 65% of the energy demands of passenger cars and light duty vehicles, as shown in all decarbonisation scenarios. Final electricity demand increases even in the high-energy efficiency scenario. Consequently, according to the Roadmap, prime focus should remain on energy efficiency. Therefore, improving energy efficiency is a priority in all decarbonisation scenarios and thus also one of the major challenges with regard to the flagship initiative of a resource efficient Europe.
Contribution of micro- and nanoelectronics to the solution of the problem
As one of the key enabling technologies, micro- and nanoelectronics, including semiconductors, are essential for all goods and services which need intelligent control in sectors as diverse as automotive and transportation, aeronautics and space. Smart industrial control systems permit more efficient management of electricity generation, storage, transport and consumption through intelligent electrical grids and devices . Smart control systems are also crucial to increasing the efficiency and reducing the unwanted emissions related to the use of conventional fuels (oil, coal and natural gas) in all its forms and applications.
Nevertheless, Europe has a number of dedicated regions with critical mass and particular semiconductor competencies which are recognised world-wide. These clusters, which jointly will implement Silicon Europe, address all application fields and have access to the most advanced technologies.
Micro- and nanoelectronics are the basis for a strong European economy. There is no computer, mobile, appliance or even car without it. Electronic components also contribute to improving manufacturing processes or to enabling new communication technologies. Thus, micro- and nanoelectronics are a key driver for innovation for almost all sectors and a key enabling technology for the vast number of industrial fields and sectors.
Without key enabling technologies, such as micro and nanoelectronics leading to new applications within building automation and controls as well as demand response, achieving substantial energy efficiency improvements will only remain a dream.
As a conclusion, the most urgent challenge in micro- and nanoelectronics is to increase massively energy efficiency, especially in its key sector ICT. This need arises from the future availability of resources (the finite nature of fossil fuels) and the increasing demand for energy worldwide (also, since even the continued development of renewable energies will not be enough close the large gap in demand). Substantial progress can only be achieved through key innovations and new system approaches that are based on a combination of cutting-edge in scientific research, close-to-market development and world-leading know-how in manufacturing processes.
By joining technological expertise and resources of Europe’s leading actors in European micro- and nanoelectronics the Silicon Europe cluster, will create a new quality of transnational collaboration. This will enable Europe to become the world’s leading centre for energy efficient electronics while effectively working to counteract increasing energy demand.
The participating clusters form the core for a leading edge cluster dealing with one of the most important key enabling technologies, namely micro- and nanoelectronics. Based on their unique combination of synergetic strengths, Silicon Europe has the potential to contribute significantly to the achievements of the aims of the Strategy for a resource efficient Europe.
Silicon Europe will have a global visibility and will also be highly competitive, focusing on the innovation component of energy efficiency.
The following picture shows the competences and strengths of the involved clusters on different levels.
Figure 1: Competences and strengths
Silicon Europe’s efforts in micro- and nanoelectronics will significantly contribute to Europe’s economic and innovative strength – both in the short and the long term. In the short term, micro- and nanoelectronics will help traditional industries to open up new markets and their utilisation will lead to the increase of energy efficiency in all sectors. Furthermore, Silicon Europe completes and strengthens the value chain of Europeans semiconductor eco-system and will be a role model for inter-cluster cooperation. Ultimately, the European semiconductor industry will be boosted and thus enabled to take on the Asian and global challenge on the market. The Silicon Europe initiative will raise the awareness of the importance of the European semiconductor industry in the wider public and authorities.
The capacity to generate innovations and successfully transfer them to the market is a key skill for Europe. This innovative force is decisive for the competitiveness and therefore ultimately for Europe’s sustainability. In order to maintain and strengthen Europe, securing the innovative ability must be equated with securing the future of Europe. It is a task to look far ahead into the future and to detect even weak signals in order to identify any resulting changes, to verify the relevance of these changes and assess them from a strategic viewpoint.
Micro- and nanoelectronics have a major impact on and therefore will make a significant contribution to the successful handling of the mega trends, Europe is confronted with, including e.g. climate protection, a society that is shifting from industry to knowledge, the globalisation and optical, energy and environmental technologies. Mostly, the sector’s developments and its findings regarding energy efficiency are effecting not only the technical disciplines but also the population’s daily life.
Project Results:
3 Main S & T results/foregrounds
3.1 Overall Strategy
Silicon Europe was organised in six work packages. There were three different implementation phases of the project:
a) phase 1 (WP 2) = in-depth analysis phase, allowing to have a comparable information basis for the decisions to be made in phase 2 for all participation clusters as well as mapping of other relevant micro- and nanoelectronics clusters including relevant key indicators.
The decision on the differentiation of S&T objectives on the regional level (harmonised smart specialisation) while using all potential synergies forms the milestone MS1 that leads to the shift into phase 2.
b) phase 2 = the core of the project: Within WP 3 and WP 4, a Joint action plans was drafted with regard to the smart specialisation, additionally there will be an harmonised joint action plan for the virtual cluster at a European level. In this regard, within WP 4, a dedicated strategy for internationalisation have been developed.
This includes also dedicated actions in an internationalisation strategy for dealing with the global competitors as well as potential collaborators (e.g. clusters in UK or Italy) on a European level.
c) phase 3: Within WP 5, accompanying measures such as joint recruitment campaigns and joint training sessions have been taken place in order to facilitate the implementation of the action plan(s).
WP 1 – Management as well as WP 6 – Communication and dissemination were implemented throughout all phases, allowing a smooth implementation within time, budget and quality of the envisaged objectives. Within WP 6 different ways of communicating the key messages were developed for the different target groups.
Figure 2: Phases of project
Figure 3: Timeline work packages
3.2 Main Outcomes
The main outcomes of the project are:
• Extension of partly existing cooperation between mature European micro- and nanoelectronics clusters
• In-depth SWOT analysis of existing policies of the relevant stakeholders and development of respective recommendations for improvement/harmonisation, contributing to the development of regional smart specialisation strategies
• Development of Joint Action Plans within the participating regions
o joint strategy for internationalisation
o transfer of best practices between the regions regarding improvement of collaboration
o dedicated financial plan for implementation
• Boosted competitiveness through the development of a joint internationalisation strategy, including development of a common visual identity, and including partnerships with other European and world-wide clusters
• Staff exchanges to initiate common projects
• Promotion of the visibility of regional research driven clusters and promotion of the utilization of micro- and nanoelectronics as key enabling technology, by a series of regional level and European level workshops, development of various communication material
3.2.1 In depth analysis
During phase 1 (WP 2) an in depth-analysis of the involved regional ecosystems and clusters were made to identify complementarities, synergies and smart specialisation potential. The analysis gives an inside into the existing local situations considering the following topics:
• Regional RTD and economic development policies, plans and activities
• Regional public and private RTD actors as well as financial actors related to RTD
• Existing regional smart specialization strategies
• Existing regional cluster policies
Data collecting was completed with report D2.1 Regional cartography on RTD.
For all cluster partners a common semiconductor value chain were defined, which was the basis of the detailed analysis of the respective regional ecosystems.
Figure 4: Silicon Europe Value Chain
For data access reasons, only companies that are member of one of the relevant cluster organisations have been assessed.
Cluster members that are not directly involved in the semiconductor value chain (such as public authorities or companies delivering horizontal services such as accounting etc.) have not been taken into account.
Figure 5: Silicon Europe Cluster structure, # of organisations
Figure 6: Silicon Europe Value chains, # of organisations
Figure 7: Silicon Europe Market focus
A regional SWOT analysis from an economic, innovation and RTD perspective has been elaborated for each region to explore the potential for each region for a smart specialisation strategy. It can be concluded that all five clusters together have strengths along the whole semiconductor value chain. An overview for all clusters is shown in figure 8 (bigger font means the cluster has particularly high competences compared to the other regions). The regional SWOT analysis was completed with the report D2.2 “Regional SWOT analysis from an economic, innovation and RTD perspective”.
Figure 8: Joint value chain with focus for potential smart specialisation
Common weaknesses for all regions are linked to the typical small and medium sized enterprises structure, for example, less impact on policymaking, dependency on large enterprises or less production volume. Most of the clusters see strong potential for future growth in the field of applications and application platforms. There is even a clear expectation that by combining competences from the different regions, this field should become a strong European asset. Key aspects are actions to work out a strategy and take action to enhance the inter-European cluster cooperation as an enabler on specific (technological) topics. It is important to improve the cooperation between SMEs (the majority in all clusters) and the large enterprises (the largest employment source). Asia as the upcoming innovator has been identified as common threat of all five clusters. There are overlaps of competences per region as well differences, for example in the sub value chain for equipment or Systems.
Figure 9: Sub value chain equipment, , # of organisations
Figure 10: Sub value chain systems, # of organisations
Based on this regional data, a structured European matrix were developed. One hundred common SWOT indicators have been identified. These have been grouped and ranked according to a common priority by general consensus. This format allows a comparison of the data and an evaluation of the joint strengths and the individual complementarities needed to build a strong cluster cooperation. The 24 high-priority indicators are listed the table below.
Figure 11: Consolidation for the commonalities and complementarities with high priority
The results of the report D2.3 Complementarities analysis as well of D2.1 and D2.3 are the basis for phase 2, the development of a Joint Action Plan and internationalisation strategy.
3.2.2 Joint Action Plan
In phase 2 (WP 3) the Joint Action Plan (JAP) was developed. It describes the strategy to realise the objectives as have been defined for the Silicon Europe meta-cluster together with a concrete implementation roadmap for 2016 – 2018.
Based on the analysis of the commonalities and complementarities the starting point for developing a joint action plan was the list of 24 high priority actions. These actions has been further analysed by the cluster organisations with the support of appropriate cluster members. Several meetings with regional stakeholders have been arranged to gain insight in the needs and wishes of the regional actors and to validate the finding of WP 2. A further reduction of action items has been made towards a manageable number of JAP elements. 14 action items were selected and described in detail in so-called “fiches”, a kind of preliminary project outlines.
1. Initiate involvement in KET pilot lines
2. Facilitate matchmaking for smart specialisation
3. Regional and European support for economic development activities
4. Availability of technologies for electronics for efficient and future power applications
5. Increase the international visibility of the cluster
6. Regional and European support for the internationalisation strategies
7. Initiate participation of SMEs in Horizon 2020
8. Initiate participation of SMEs in JTIs (ECSEL)
9. Initiate strategic cooperation with foreign clusters
10. Focus on markets related to energy efficiency
11. Facilitate knowledge transfer
12. Detect market opportunities outside the regional markets
13. Open foreign markets for SMEs
14. Support to the development of essential technologies
Out of these 14 action items six project outlines have been defined and presented to regional and international experts for feedback.
1. Create a European MNE meta-cluster
2. Technology & knowledge
a. Make sure the required key technologies within the MNE field are available and when relevant also producible in Europe
b. Make the state of the art knowledge and know-how, both on technological and economic/business levels, available to the companies of the different clusters
3. Implement the smart specialization strategy
4. Bridge the gap between SMEs and funding instruments
5. Increase the business opportunities for the companies belonging to the cluster(s) by international business development
6. Promote the MNE technology to both the public and the politics
Projects 2 to 6 cover the full scope of the activities needed: financial support, market, technology and knowledge, smart specialisation and communication all bound together through the product value chain. The first project outline, the creation of a European MNE meta-cluster, is necessary to enable the execution of the different projects in a sustainable cooperation mode between the leading clusters
For the final Joint Action Plan five strategic themes have been selected.
1. Knowledge and technology transfer
Clusters support exchange throughout Europe
Within this theme, Silicon Europe will mainly take charge of the following activities:
• Technology market fairs where targeted markets will be brought into contact with MNE developers to align their respective roadmaps and also to set-up collaborations
• Mapping of the knowledge and technology sources
• Organisation of academic colloquia with a low threshold level for the industry
• Support of a human capital actions addressing mobility, education, training, and most importantly
• promoting the MNE industry as a challenging and rewarding sector for an excellent career
• Encouraging and supporting the creation and use by SMEs of platforms as field labs, pilot lines and competence centres
2. Smart Specialisation
R&D along the regional strongholds and markets
Within this theme, Silicon Europe will mainly take charge of the following activities:
• Support in the creation and international use of regional field labs
• Develop new approaches, in order to emphasise on economic transformation and on building interregional value chains
• Establish a platform for an exchange of experiences and best practices for the implementation of micro- and nanoelectronics based on smart specialisation strategies throughout the Silicon Europe consortium
• Support the cross-regional cooperation of both ERDF and regionally funded projects, support project consortia to match ERDF funds with H2020 projects or vice versa
3. SME funding
Clusters liaise SMEs to sources of capital
Within this theme, Silicon Europe will mainly take charge of the following activities:
• Acting as an intermediary between SMEs and different public and private financing opportunities through providing information, networking opportunities and assistance in acquiring the skills needed to access different funds
• Actively contributing to designing SME-friendly funding programmes
• Identification and contacts of accelerators abroad
• Organizing events to attract venture capitalists (VCs)
• Supporting both SMEs and e.g. VCs in judging and appreciating the investment needs and risks
4. International business development
Increase international visibility and consequently detect and create opportunities for the (SME) members
Within this theme, Silicon Europe will mainly take charge of the following activities:
• Support electronics companies, and more in particular SMEs, to be present in foreign markets either for business or partnerships:
• Increasing visibility and attractiveness of the European industry abroad at first in Taiwan and in the US, subsequently in other markets (such as up and coming European regions and outside the EU)
• Support to the implementation of joint innovation projects
• Support in scouting possible foreign commercial opportunities for the Silicon Europe partner companies
• Attract foreign investment money or actors missing in Europe’s value chain
5. Promotion of micro- and nanoelectronics
Communicate at large the indispensable role in to-day´s and future society
Within this theme, Silicon Europe will mainly take charge of the following activities:
• Initiating case-studies showing the essential role of MNE, promoting MNE in the whole value chain linked with application and narrated in an accessible way
• Initiating MNE companies to explain the technologies and their value to a broad audience
• Communicating on the strengths of the European MNE industry in Europe and abroad
3.2.3 Internationalisation Strategy
Within phase 2 (WP 4), the Silicon Europe partners have also done a thorough analysis of clusters outside Europe. Taiwan and USA have been clearly identified as the regions with the highest priority. The analysis was supported by a clusters benchmark of potential interesting competing regions (D4.2 “Report on international partners”).
Different lists of tables were created which allowed the Silicon Europe cluster partners to prioritise and rank the most important clusters for future collaboration (D4.1 “Report on tools for collaboration”).
• List of European MNE clusters
• List of European application clusters
• List of international clusters
• List of European events
• List of worldwide events
Table 1: List of European European micro-nanoelectronics cluster (extract of D4.1)
Given the results of the WP 2 SWOT consolidation and priorities, it was decided to enlarge this list to include some European application clusters.
Table 2: Selected European Application clusters
The next table shows the selected worldwide MNE clusters.
Table 3: Selected worldwide MNE clusters
Table 4: Summary table about types of clusters, Europe and World Wide
To be able to measure the success of the internationalisation of Silicon Europe a list of indicators was created.
Table 5: List of indicators
An internationalisation plan for the regions and countries beyond Europe was defined. Main activities are exploration, matchmaking and communication. Taiwan has been chosen as the first country to approach.
Figure 12: Overview of interesting regions
The deliverable D4.3 shows how cluster members will be supported in their international action, both within and outside Europe, to increase their activities, to develop business relationships, to attract financing and to continue to innovate. The Silicon Europe partnership has established a recognisable brand, by using the critical mass that the meta-cluster represents, to increase visibility of the European MNE industry in their actions abroad and to global attract key player to come to Europe to exercise their activities.
Mission to Taiwan
Taiwan has been selected as one of the priority regions outside of Europe as part of the Silicon Europe internationalisation strategy. Several activities to explore and further develop the relation between Europe and Taiwan have been defined as part of this strategy.
SEMICON Taiwan 2014
First annual Silicon Europe Taiwan Day, September 4, 2014 in Taipei
The European Economic and Trade Office (EETO), together with the European Business Regulatory Cooperation (EBRC) hosted a field of distinguished micro- and nanoelectronics experts from the European Commission and Members States at its first annual Silicon Europe Taiwan Day. The half-day event on the theme “Enhancing transnational and cross-continental innovation“, attended by around 110 representatives of European and Taiwanese industry and research entities, showcased insights on European excellence in the fields of micro- and nanoelectronics, presented European competitive clusters’ know-how, experience and innovations, such as “Silicon Europe”, as well as offered opportunities for direct B2B matchmaking. The forum was part of the EU’s efforts to enhance EU-Taiwan cooperation aimed at paving the way for sustainable engagement and cooperation between Europe and Taiwan. The experts shared presentations on the value of clusters in fostering innovation as well as research and innovation related to electronic components and systems in Europe and the strengths of European microelectronics.
The partners of the European clusters alliance Silicon Europe shared their expertise in disruptive innovation and technological development, cooperation within individual clusters and with European clusters, and called for international cooperation with Taiwan. The experts delivered a clear message that cooperation between industry, academia and administrations has been a key enabler in enhancing successful IT and micro- and nanoelectronics clusters in Europe. The European ecosystem for innovation is expected to be a good example for the development of Taiwanese high-tech clusters and future EU-Taiwan cooperation.
SEMICON Taiwan 2015
Fact Finding Mission & Silicon Europe – EBRC Workshop, September 1-3, 2015 in Taipei
From September 1-3, 2015, a Silicon Europe delegation visited Taiwan again. In addition to attending the Semicon Taiwan event, this mission proved to be the opportunity for the Silicon Europe delegation to meet representatives of the Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST), the Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA), several departments of the Industrial Technology and Research institute (ITRI), the Taiwan Semiconductor Association (TSIA) and the European Chamber of Commerce in Taiwan.
In collaboration with the EBRC (European Business and Regulatory Program), a workshop was organised during the Semicon Taiwan conference on the theme “Internet of Things as a driver for Semiconductors: beyond Moore”. Speakers from the different Silicon Europe countries gave presentations in front of a Taiwanese audience. The half-day event, which was attended by 70 people, brought together key industrial and institutional micro- and nanoelectronics players from Europe and Taiwan to share insights in the fields of micro- and nanoelectronics, present know-how, experience and innovations realized through industry clusters as well as to offer opportunities for direct business to business (B2B) matchmaking.
The Silicon Europe Alliance was explained and promoted. Several useful contacts were established and agreements for follow up have been made. As a result, matchmaking events for companies will be organised in Taiwan in 2016.
2nd Indo-German SME Forum in New Delhi, September 22-23, 2014 in New Dehli
The forum was about “cluster internationalisation” and provided a platform to foster linkages between public authorities, clusters, industry and other service providers from India and Germany. During this event, the Silicon Europe project was presented and looked for potential collaboration within the Silicon Europe context. Based on the knowledge we have gained through this event, India will have no priority for the internationalization strategy at this stage.
Implementation of the third country internationalisation strategy
The Silicon Europe partners used the opportunity of the call COS-CLUSTER_2014-3-03 – Cluster got international to submit a proposal with two other clusters in Greece and Italy. The proposal ESCiP “European Semiconductor Cluster Internationalisation Project” was accepted and will continue the collaboration with Taiwan. Besides Taiwan the US has been also selected as one of the priority regions outside of Europe.
Actions with other European MNE clusters
Since October 2011, twelve European Semiconductor Cluster organisations meet twice a year to share information and experiences from each cluster and to develop joint initiatives for cooperation.
• ME2C, FEEI (Austria)
• DSP Valley (Belgium)
• Minalogic, ARCSIS (France)
• Silicon Saxony (Germany)
• Corallia mi-Cluster (Greece)
• MIDAS (Ireland)
• Fondazione Distretto Green & High Tech Monza Brianza (Italy)
• High Tech NL, BCS (The Netherlands)
• NMI (UK)
As a complement to the Silicon Europe project, the European Semiconductor Cluster Forum (ESCF) improves the contacts between the European MNE clusters. The Silicon Europe cluster is the future of this Forum. In October 2015, four other clusters of this Forum joined the Silicon Europe Alliance, thus 10 MNE clusters of the ESCF are members of the Silicon Europe Alliance.
Joint Silicon Europe booth presentations
To promote Silicon Europe and the European micro- and nanoelectronics industry abroad joint booths at international fairs were organised. The Silicon Europe project was presented on the booth of Silicon Saxony during Semicon Europa in Dresden in October 2013. During the High-Tech Systems Conference in Den Bosch in May 2014, Silicon Europe was also present with a booth. Communication tools such as poster materials, as well as a “commercial and marketing flyer” were realised. This flyer, completed in April 2014, is dedicated to show a strong and comprehensive image of the European micro-and nanoelectronic industry outside the European border.
The Silicon Europe project was also shown, e. g. on the booth of Minalogic and Silicon Saxony during Semicon Europa in Grenoble in October 2014, on the booth of Silicon Saxony during Semicon Europa in Dresden in October 2015 and on the European pavilion during Semicon West in San Francisco in July 2014/15.
For improving links between the cluster members and for increasing partnership opportunities Silicon Europe cluster´ flagship events were opened to members from other clusters, e. g. DSP Valley Smart Systems Industry Summit in October 2014/15 or Silicon Saxony Day in July 2014/15.
3.2.4 Accompanying measures
In phase 3 (WP 5), accompanying measures took place in order to facilitate the implementation of the Joint Action Plan.
DSP Valley has developed the financial plan to support the execution of the Joint Action Plan. It has resulted in a directory of the local, regional, national and European funding sources and other support on themes addressed by the Silicon Europe Joint Action Plan (D5.1).
Several initiatives have been taken to propose new projects. Concrete opportunities have been pursued and project proposals have been written: e.g. COS-WP2014-4-05 - Erasmus for Young Entrepreneurs and COS-CLUSTER-2014-3-03 – Cluster Go International.
In addition to the search for funding opportunities for Silicon Europe activities, the Silicon Europe partners are also contributing to pre-existing or new funding programmes in the role of an interface for SMEs. Silicon Europe was instrumental in supporting PENTA, a recently endorsed Eureka Cluster that will replace CATRENE as a funding programme, capitalising on its strengths and offering remedies to its identified weaknesses (not least an insufficient SME involvement). The first PENTA call for project proposals is expected to open in first quarter 2016. Initially, the Cluster is scheduled to run for 5 years. Silicon Europe will contribute to ensuring a real SME involvement in the new programme through a Europe wide dissemination of the calls and to the creation of the aforementioned “market place’.
The successful implementation of the JAP will strongly depend on the mutual trust and willingness of the different cluster organisations to cooperate and implement the different actions but also on the trust of the cluster members in the proposed cross-regional activities. The best way to build trust among organisations is to gradually start implementing parts of an action plan. People will get to learn each other and each other´s organisation. Silicon Europe started with the implementation of some activities like opening up of regional events towards the members of the other clusters organisations or common presence on relevant international fairs.
An overview of initiatives have been taken to propose new projects and trust building activities is given in D5.2.
Table 6: Regional events opened towards the members of the other cluster organisations
Table 7: Common presence on international fairs
In order to be able to implement the actions defined in the JAP, it is important that all people from the participating cluster organisations who will be involved in those actions are well trained. Aspects such as international project management, participating to regional and European calls, internationalisation and joined training sessions should get attention.
On June 30th, 2015, a training session has been organised on the subject of Business in Taiwan. The trainer was Pascal Viaud, who is the local representative in Taiwan for the Invest in Grenoble/AEPI organisation. Unfortunately, due to unforeseen circumstances, the training had to be cancelled but might be implemented at a more convenient time later on after ending of Silicon Europe project.
On October 8th, 2015, a training session for cluster management has been organised on the subject cluster internationalisation and new roles of cluster managements in Dresden during Semicon Europa. This workshop was conducted by Dr. Gerd Meier zu Köcker, Head of European Cluster Observatory Team and main initiator of the European Cluster Excellence Initiative ECEI and founder of ESCA.
Within the COSME call "Cluster Excellence Programme" COS–WP 2014-3-04 a project proposal has been worked out to improve the cluster management excellence including further training activities of cluster (management) staff. The following topics for training have already been identified: Cluster Economics, Cluster Initiative Screening, Industry Analysis and Segmentation, Value Chain Analysis, Benchmarking and Internationalization of SMEs. The project proposal CLEXIM (Cluster excellence in micro- and nanoelectronic clusters) was submitted in June 2015.
Since October 2010, 12 European Semiconductor Clusters are meeting twice a year for sharing information from their clusters. The European Semiconductor Cluster Forum (ESCF) allows for the clusters to exchange details about their activities. It is as such offering a platform for exchanging best practices, exchanging ideas and learning about MNE outside the own region.
Staff exchange is also a measure to increase the competence level of people. Already from the start of the project it was decided to mutually invite the staff of the partners in the project to the “flagship” events of each cluster, in order to build-up the cooperation. This created the unique opportunities where the staff exchanged the experiences and learned on the best practices used in each cluster.
Table 8: Staff exchange related to clusters´ flagship events
The deliverable D5.3 represents the activities regarding joint training sessions and recruitment campaigns.
Companies can only be successful in case they can rely on a sufficient number of competent people. Recruitment activities will be organised on cross-regional level to increase the probability of finding the right people. Each cluster promotes vacancies of their cluster members to the whole of Silicon Europe.
The Silicon Europe partners have ongoing activities on recruitment based on the following activities:
- On-line vacancies: e.g. Silicon Europe members can post their vacancies on the cluster websites.
- Job fairs: On regional and international level, screening potential candidates and distribute their applications to the cluster members.
- Workshops: e.g. organising of workshops for international recruitment with focus on the requirements and modalities to be completed when employing a foreign candidate.
3.2.5 Promotion of visibility of EU clusters and of the utilization of MNE as KET
Communication and dissemination are being implemented throughout all phases of the project (WP 6). The main activities were focused on ensuring a consistent inside and outside project communication and dissemination. At the beginning of the project we set up a project website (D6.1 www.silicon-europe.eu) with extensive information about the project and the involved clusters.
All Silicon Europe publications and news were uploaded on the webpage www.silicon-europe.eu and were frequently updated by ourselves. Silicon Europe posted messages via Twitter regularly and has established a LinkedIn account.
A Silicon Europe presentation and event schedule (D6.2) were created and adapted to the current project progress regularly. We also published the Silicon Europe newsletter (D6.3) twice a year.
One part of our activities to ensuring a consistent outside project communication and dissemination are publications on press and other media (D6.4).
The publications on press focus on main activities like the start of the project in October 2012, the cluster meeting with the political representatives of the involved regions in February 2013 or the final Silicon Europe activities during Semicon Europa in October 2015. The project duration has been extended by one month as the final project activities have been taken place during Semicon Europa in October 2015.
For dissemination activities, different communication materials were prepared like a Silicon Europe brochure, a flyer especially for use beyond Europe, Silicon Europe stickers, Silicon Europe business cards, roll-up banners and the brochure A 5 Step Joint Action Plan. We also created an image video (D6.5 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3a1ja_ofSMk).
Figure 13: Silicon Europe brochures and flyer
For successful stakeholder involvement, the following dissemination events were organised by Silicon Europe.
In collaboration with the Saxon Ministry of Education and Research, a dissemination event with regional political representatives of the clusters was held in Brussels on February 20th, 2013. The political representatives talked on the future of microelectronics as a key enabling technology. Silicon Europe was presented and a joint Silicon Europe position paper was discussed as part of this talk. The Silicon Europe clusters´ joint statement was signed by representatives of the regional governments of Rhône-Alpes and Saxony during the follow-up meeting on February 13th, 2014 in Grenoble. It was also endorsed by the regional authorities of Carinthia. Of course, it carries the signatures of all triple helix clusters of Silicon Europe.
Figure 14: Silicon Europe Clusters´ Joint Statement
Successful involvement of European Commission
On October 1st, 2013 DG Connect, Directorate A unit Components has met with Silicon Europe on the implementation of the 'European Strategy for micro-and nanoelectronics components and systems in Brussels. During this meeting Silicon Europe was invited to give their vision and expectations on the European Strategy as presented on May 23rd, 2013 and to put forward their ability to contribute to the implementation of the strategy. The follow-up workshop of this meeting took place on November 28th, 2013 in Brussels. The regions of Saxony, Grenoble, the Southern region of Netherlands and the region Flanders made presentation of their approach to smart specialisation, the definition of the Partnership Agreement and in later stage the Operational Plans. DG Connect made a short presentation on the progress of the so-called combination of funding and how this could work in the future to support larger innovation/investment projects with a mix of H2020 and ESIF funds.
Successful involvement of representatives of industry, research and politics
Silicon Europe Policy Workshop on micro- and nanoelectronics and its role as key enabling technology
On November 5th, 2014, the partners of the project Silicon Europe discussed at the Saxon Liaison Office Brussels the challenges and opportunities with regards to reindustrialization of Europe that arise from micro- and nanoelectronics and its role as key enabling technology.
Representatives of the European Parliament as well as representatives of industry, research institutes and regional authorities gave an insight into their respective views.
The Semi industry in Europe is of strategic importance – chips are everywhere. MNE is essential for European leadership in future and emerging markets worldwide and is the enabler for all key areas such as mobility, health, energy efficiency, security and convenience. MNE is the enabler for “Smart Anything”.
Even though Europe is acting already, e.g. ECSEL program, the investments need to be accelerated and intensified to retain and increase the global competitiveness of MNE to compete with countries like China and US which have a huge programme of investment in MNE. In this respect, it was appealed mainly to economic players to have the courage to invest in MNE. The European industry needs visionaries to establish new big global players made in Europe.
With regards to the European strategy for Key Enabling Technologies it is essential to pursue consequently the approach already taken by the European Commission.
Besides investments in new development projects and pilot lines it is also important to make targeted investments in new talents as they are the workers of the future in modern fabs. In this context research institutes play an important role.
Figure 15: Impressions of Silicon Europe policy workshop
Final Silicon Europe project activities during Semicon Europa 2015 in Dresden
The final Silicon Europe conference in October 2015 consist of different activities:
• Final Steering Committee Meeting, Oct 5
• Press conference, Oct 6
• 9th European Semiconductor Cluster Forum (ESCF), Oct 6
• Public workshop, Oct 7
• VIP guided tours, Oct 6+7
• Taste of Silicon Europe booth event, Oct 7
• B2B matchmaking, Oct 6-8
Final Steering Committee Meeting, October 5th, 2015
During the Steering Committee Meeting, the Silicon Europe project was reviewed. Under the brand of Silicon Europe, the partnership will be continued after the end of the funded period of the project. Six new cluster members were approved and the new board was elected for the first two years (2016/2017). The new board consists of the Chairman Peter Simkens (DSP Valley) and the Vice-Chairwoman Isabelle Guillaume (Minalogic). According to the statute of the new Silicon Europe Alliance Peter Simkens and Isabelle Guillaume will switch their roles for the second year.
Silicon Europe press conference, October 6th, 2015
Press release: http://www.silicon-europe.eu/files/2015/10/MI_0215_SE_Press-release_6-Oct-2015_ENG.pdf
During the press conference, the Silicon Europe partners announced continuation of their collaboration after the end of the project, deepening and enlarging it into the Silicon Europe Alliance. Another six European clusters have joined the Silicon Europe Alliance. The cluster partners presented the step-by-step strategy for the time till 2018 (“Joining Forces for European Leadership for Innovative Electronics – A 5 Step Joint Action Plan”) to the media.
Figure 16: Impressions of Silicon Europe press conference on October 6th, 2015
9th European Semiconductor Cluster Forum (ESCF), October 6th, 2015
The current status of the Silicon Europe project, vision and future activities were discussed within the participating clusters. The decision was taken to combine ESCF with Silicon Europe due to the large overlap regarding the member basis, which was nearly the same after joining of the six new MNE clusters to Silicon Europe Alliance.
Public workshop, October 7th, 2015
“Workshop on the Role of the European Clusters and Regions in Electronic Components and Systems”
The workshop aimed to take stock, exchange views and consolidate relations with the relevant stakeholders. The workshop also discussed possible next steps which may include the organisation in 2016 of a high level meeting.
Reaching out to regions and clusters is part of the Industrial Strategy for the Electronics Industry in Europe. The workshop was built on ongoing initiatives in particular Silicon Europe and the European Semiconductor Cluster Forum (ESCF). Furthermore, it used the results of the smart specialisation workshop held in 2014 in Villach (Austria) and of the workshop held on April 29th, 2015 with the RTO’s in Brussels.
The workshop intended to respond to the stronger need for cooperation and coordination, networking and strengthening the eco-system with specific emphasis on the role of regions and clusters. In particular, the access to finance (including EFSI and ESIF) and smart specialisation were featured on the agenda.
At the workshop, Silicon Europe presented its Joint Action Plan and the impact achieved so far already. More than 50 participants attended the workshop.
The event was web streamed to follow it live (http://www.silicon-europe.eu/events/workshop-europaen-clusters).
The organisation of the workshop was done by DG CONNECT and Silicon Europe. The outcome is an action paper prepared by DG CONNECT. Recommendations for different levels are outlined in this paper.
Recommendation 1 – Internationalisation
• Europe should acquire better hands-on knowledge of Asian markets, which often drive demand and supply – accessing such markets is essential for the health of the European industry.
(Recommendation applicable to the European level)
• Europe should increase the visibility of the European electronic components and systems industry internationally, for example in Taiwan and the USA.
(Recommendation applicable to National and Regional levels)
• Europe needs to support the internationalisation of SMEs.
(Recommendation applicable to National and Regional levels)
• Europe should take advantage of our attractive innovation and cluster environment to attract talents and start-ups from elsewhere including Asia to Europe, leading to a more balanced collaboration.
(Recommendation applicable to National and Regional levels)
Recommendation 2 – Identifying and exploiting commercial and application/product opportunities
• Clarify the mapping of regional smart specialisation expertise, as carried out in the Eye@RIS3 mapping exercise, and introduce an application areas focus within regional smart specialisation strategies.
(Recommendation applicable to the European and Regional levels)
• Exploit the innovation expertise within existing cluster organisations, such as the Silicon Europe Alliance, to work with the regions to identify attractive commercial and product/applications development opportunities.
(Recommendation applicable to the Regional level)
Recommendation 3 – Financial support and state aid
• Prioritise the development of an IPCEI suited to effective exploitation and support of Europe’s micro- and nanoelectronics expertise and industrial infrastructure.
(Recommendation applicable to the European, National and Regional levels)
Figure 17: Impressions of final public workshop
The proceedings of public workshop are summarised in D6.6.
VIP guided tours, October 6+7th, 2015
Silicon Europe together with the City of Dresden organised two guided tours at Semicon Europa including a meeting with new Semi Europe President Laith Altimime. The representatives of the regions visited among others the Alleé de Cluster and selected Silicon Europe member companies. The Lord Mayor City of Dresden hosted a joint Public Authority Lunch with the following agenda points: Silicon Europe Alliance and Joint Action Plan, EU Project ESCIP and common potential activities.
Taste of Silicon Europe booth event, October 7th, 2015
The joint Silicon Europe event took place at the Allée des Clusters. Invited were all visitors and exhibitors of Semicon Europa to come to the Allée des Clusters. The whole Silicon Europe consortium and cluster members were represented. All clusters sponsored this event with regional food and beverages. For dissemination glasses with the Silicon Europe brand were created.
B2B matchmaking, October 6-8th, 2015
The organisation of the B2B matchmaking event was organized by Enterprise Europe Network (EEN) and Silicon Europe (https://www.b2match.eu/Semiconeu2015). In total 100 meetings have been arranged with participants from 22 countries.
Further dissemination events and booths presentations
Silicon Europe presentations were given at various events. Some examples of dissemination events are, e.g.:
• European Semiconductor Cluster Forum (ESCF) twice a year
• Silicon Europe session at DATE Conference in Grenoble, March 2013
• Silicon Europe presentation at INC9 Conference in Berlin, May 2013
• Silicon Europe European Commission Tour, March 2015
• Semicon Japan in Tokyo, December 2014
• Smart Specialisation Conference in Villach, May 2014
• Catrene Workshop in Grenoble, June 2014
• Launch of the European Smart Anything Everywhere Initiative in Grenoble, March 2015
• European Conference On Digital And Key Enabling Technologies Skills, June 2015
Silicon Europe booth has been organised at the following events, e.g.
• High Tech Systems Conference in Den Bosch, May 2014 and March 2015
• Silicon Saxony Day in Dresden, July 2014 and 2015
• Semicon Europa, Oct 2014 in Grenoble and Oct 2012/2013 /2015 in Dresden
• Smart Systems Industry Summit in Mechelen, Oct 2013, 2014 and 2015
A strong Silicon Europe brand was created within the project. It is the brand under which the leading micro- and nanoelectronics clusters in Europe collaborate to represent, support and promote the companies and organisations belonging to their eco-system both on European and global level. The brand was registered in the trademark register in August 2015.
3.2.6 Definition of a European meta-cluster for MNE
A strong Silicon Europe brand was created within the project. It is the brand under which the leading micro- and nanoelectronics clusters in Europe collaborate to represent, support and promote the companies and organisations belonging to their eco-system both on European and global level. The brand was registered in the trademark register in August 2015.
Figure 18: Silicon Europe brand
The story line from the beginning of the project “Silicon Europe – The leaders for energy efficient ICT” was changed in “Silicon Europe – The leaders for innovative electronics”. After several discussions with the consortium, the decision was made to leave the narrow focus to address a wider technological field.
A joint vision mission statement was agreed by all partners.
Objectives of the meta-cluster:
Figure 19: Vision of Silicon Europe
Figure 20: Mission statement of Silicon Europe
The Silicon Europe partners have set up a Statute for a formal cooperation under the brand of Silicon Europe after the end of the funded period of the project. This also includes an opening towards clusters beyond the initial project partnership.
The new Silicon Europe Alliance, the continuation of the strong cooperation beyond the timeframe of the project, was announced at the Silicon Europe press conference during Semicon Europa in Dresden in October 2015.
The new board of the alliance consists of the Chairman Peter Simkens (DSP Valley) and the Vice-Chairwoman Isabelle Guillaume (Minalogic). According to the statute of the new Silicon Europe Alliance Peter Simkens and Isabelle Guillaume will switch their roles for the second year. The partners of the Silicon Europe Alliance are committed to implement the agreed Joint Action Plan by signing the Silicon Europe Statute.
3.2.7 Enlarging the Silicon Europe partnership
One main focus of the project was to enlarge the basis, both geographically and technologically. Already during the timeframe of the project two further clusters have joined the project as associated partners.
• Business Cluster Semiconductors (BSC), The Netherlands
• ME2C, Austria
The associated partners have contributed to all phases of the project, but without getting any money from the grant.
From 2012 to 2015, the number of members from the participating clusters has also increased.
Table 9: Growths number of members from the clusters
The cross-regional cooperation will be continued after the end of the funded period. Six new cluster members have joined the Silicon Europe Alliance in October 2015.
• Distretto Green & High Tech (Italy)
• MIDAS (Ireland)
• GAIA (Spain)
• NMI (UK)
• mi-Cluster (Greece)
• SCS Cluster (France)
Now the Silicon Europe Alliance unites 12 European micro- and nanoelectronics clusters with about 2,000 cluster partners.
Two of new cluster members (Greece, Italy) are already partners of the project “ESCiP “European Semiconductor Cluster Internationalisation Project”.
3.2.8 Initialisation of business at member level
Besides the partners of Silicon Europe, the members of the participating clusters have also benefited from the Silicon Europe project as shown in the following examples.
Sofics (Belgium)
Sofics has developed new business thanks to exhibition participation with DSP Valley. Bart Keppens, Marketing Director Sofics: "Sofics joined the DSP Valley delegation for the 2014 Silicon Saxony Day, the annual meeting point for the high-tech industry, science, research and public institutions of Saxony. During the event we discussed a cooperation with Creative Chips (locations in Bingen and Dresden) for an ASIC development in advanced CMOS technology. This has led to a real contract 1.5 month after the Silicon Saxony Day. Sofics delivered customized on-Chip ESD protection clamps. A new cooperation is currently being discussed for an automotive electronics application.”
Dolphin-Integration (France)
Jean-François POLLET | VP Business Development: “Dolphin participated in the B2B event organized by DSP Valley in June 2015, alongside 3 other Minalogic companies. The outcome of this participation was positive. We found a partner whose expertise was complementary to ours, and jointly submitted a bid for a call for tender which we won! The whole thing happened very quickly after our encounter that day. It is a small project but small streams become great driver! We also met a potentially interesting Dutch partner. We do enjoy these B2B events.”
SOITEC (France)
Nelly Kernevez | Partnership director: “Thanks to Silicon Europe, SOITEC:
− promoted its SOI technologies at an event organized by Silicon Europe in Brussels in November 2014 with key policy-makers.
− was able to organize with the SOI consortium[1] a SOI workshop at the Silicon Saxony Day in Dresden in July 2015 which gathered 50 participants interested by the high level panellists composed of representatives of the industry (IFX,ST, GF, NXP), universities (UCL) and the European Commission (ECSEL).
These events allowed us to highlight the strong competitive advantage that SOI represents for the European microelectronics’ industry and its innovative applications (automotive, lightning, consumer...). It was all the more important in the context of GLOBALFOUNDRIES’ engagement in FDSOI22, to explain the importance that the technology has for industry in Europe.”
3.3 Success indicators
Within the specific objectives of Silicon Europe (see chapter 2), the following success indicators were defined.
To 1) Promotion of micro- and nanoelectronics
Success indicators (target figures):
• Number of visitors of web platform(s) (including web 2.0 components) (100.000): achieved 31019
• Number of articles in various media (newspapers, CORDIS, etc.) (50): achieved 39
To 2) Securing European know-how for Europe
Success indicators (target figures):
• Number of defined common research topics between the clusters to work on (synergies) (15): achieved 18
o Health Care and Ageing Society
o Energy Efficiency
o Automotive and Transport
o Equipment
o Materials and Manufacturing
o Semiconductor Process and Integration
o Internet of things
o Design Technologies
o Process development
o Communications and Digital Lifestyle
o embedded sensor technologies for security and safety
o Electro mobility
o Smart Systems Integration
o Agriculture
o Advanced computing
o Atomic and Molecular Scale Devices and Systems
o Robotics, Cognitive Systems & Smart Spaces
o Fully Depleted Silicon on Insulator technology (FDSOI)
• Number of Partnership agreements between institutions from the clusters within the cluster (complementarities/synergies) (20): achieved Silicon Europe clusters´ joint statement
o The clusters and regional representatives signed the Silicon Europe clusters´ joint statement. This joint statement was also agreed with key cluster members and can be also considered as a kind of partnership agreement between institutions.
• Number of common R&D projects initiated (synergies + complementarities) (10): achieved 131
To 3) Opening up new markets
Success indicators (target figures):
• Number of partnership agreements between institutions from the clusters and other institutions outside the cluster (5): achieved 6
o Zelenograd – Silicon Saxony
o Zelenograd – Minalogic
o Minalogic – Taiwan
o Silicon Europe – BCS NL (associated partner)
o Silicon Europe – ME2C (associated partner)
o Silicon Europe - Korea
• Number of publications/presentations under the common identity (10): achieved 68
Potential Impact:
4 Potential impact
Micro- and nanoelectronics will make a significant contribution to the successful handling of the mega trends including e.g. climate protection, a society that is shifting from industry to knowledge, the globalisation and optical, energy and environmental technologies. Silicon Europe’s efforts in micro- and nanoelectronics significantly contribute to Europe’s economic and innovative strength – both in the short and the long term. In the short term, micro- and nanoelectronics help traditional industries to open up new markets and their utilisation will lead to the increase of energy efficiency in all sectors. Furthermore, Silicon Europe completes and strengthens the value chain of Europeans semiconductor eco-system will be a role model for inter-cluster cooperation. Ultimately, the European semiconductor industry will be boosted and thus enabled to take on the Asian and global challenge on the market. The Silicon Europe initiative will raise the awareness of the importance of the European semiconductor industry in the wider public and authorities. The capacity to generate innovations and successfully transfer them to the market is a key skill for Europe. This innovative force is decisive for the competitiveness and therefore ultimately for Europe’s sustainability.
4.1 Expected impact from the Joint Action Plan
The Joint Action Plan is the major outcome of the Silicon Europe project. It describes the agreed actions of the Silicon Europe cluster alliance for the next 3 years (2016-2018) resulting in multiple notable impacts on different levels.
4.1.1 Impact on cluster level
The successful implementation of the Silicon Europe JAP will have a clear impact on the cluster organisations itself. Specifically, it will lead to an increase of quality in management, mainly by improving their management practices as well as their market/competitive advantages or value-chain analytical capacities and by enabling them to provide top quality services to their SMEs, especially on facilitating SMEs internationalisation, better exploiting and diffusing Key Enabling Technologies (KETs), in particular of course micro- and nanoelectronics.
Consequently, on the level of the cluster itself, i.e. on member level, this will lead to an increase of international collaboration and innovation, both within Europe as well as beyond Europe. It is expected, that at least 40% of all member companies will be engaged in such activities, thereby clearly exceeding the respective benchmark on European level (25%).
4.1.2 Impact on regional level
On the level of the regions involved, the implementation of the JAP will lead to an effective implementation of smart specialisation strategies, in particular by fostering interregional exchange of best practices.
The respective commitment has already be shown by the involved regions by forming the Vanguard initiative. These regions wish to build the synergies and complementarities in smart specialisation strategies to boost world-class clusters and cluster networks, in particular through pilots and large scale demonstrators. These investments will bolster the competitive capacity of Europe to lead in new industries for the future and develop lead-markets that offer solutions for our common challenges. The impact of Silicon Europe activities will mainly be on the SME level in this regard. Consequently, this will lead to growth of companies and employment in the participating regions. Silicon Europe is well known at local level of the participating clusters and thus able to influence policy. The regional clusters also gained more visibility due to the high level of awareness of the project.
4.1.3 Impact on European level
The implementation of the Silicon Europe activities will have a clear contribution on several technical roadmaps related to micro- and nanoelectronics, but also application areas, such as the ECSEL MASRIA or the VMS (Vision, Mission strategy) documents by EPOSS, ARTEMIS and ENIAC respectively, in particular with regard to the effective and efficient involvement of SMEs in an international project context.
The founders already prove their capacity to contribute to such an ambitious issue by actively supporting the design of a new SME friendly funding programme in the framework of EUREKA (PENTA). The Silicon Europe activities will also have a strong impact on securing proper access to finance for SMEs, both from public as well as private sources. Consequently, activities will also have an impact on participation rate of SMEs in major funding programmes related to innovation such as Horizon2020.
With regard to the implementation plan proposed by the Electronics Leaders Group the Silicon Europe activities will clearly contribute to the facilitation of the creation of the demanded world-class reference zones (4.4) as well as to realisation of the requested network of excellence centres (4.5).
The Silicon Europe partners have already launched cooperation approaches towards different clusters, e.g. in the framework of the Competitiveness and Innovation Framework Programme (CIP). A successful implementation of the JAP will further contribute to successful cross-cluster cooperation’s, also using cross-sectoral approaches, thereby fully leveraging the opportunities that arise from micro- and nanoelectronics being a key enabling technology.
Silicon Europe assured recognition at European level for the roles that cluster carry out in terms of acting as intermediary between SMEs, large companies, research institutes and politics.
4.1.4 Impact on global level
Micro- and nanoelectronics are impacting the full European value chain with 30B€ contribution to Europe GDP. MNE is one of the few industries creating jobs, is driving 90% of the innovation, is positioning Europe as worldwide leader in R&D, is networking worldwide leading companies and numerous SME’s, is integrating R&D and Manufacturing within clusters and is providing societal solutions via new technologies and applications.
Silicon Europe activities will first and foremost lead to a further increase of visibility/attractiveness of Europe as a relevant area for micro- and nanoelectronics, mainly by forming the critical mass and further increasing and exploiting the brand value of Silicon Europe as such.
This will directly impact the market valorisation of micro- and nanoelectronics as key enabling technology in traditional industry. E.g. Semiconductors provide the knowledge and technologies that generate some 10% of global GDP.
Of course micro- and nanoelectronics will be essential for making the Internet of Things (IoT) work as well and, even more important to ensure a leading position of Europe within this field.
Improving energy efficiency is a priority in all decarbonisation scenarios and thus also one of the major challenges with regard to the flagship initiative of ‘a resource efficient Europe’. The improvements in R&D in the field of micro- and nanoelectronics, but also the increased utilisation as effect of the increased awareness will have a major impact on energy efficiency.
In the Silicon Europe cluster, the value chain of micro- and nanoelectronics is extensively represented. All Silicon Europe partners together have strengths along the whole semiconductor value chain. Micro- and nanoelectronics require a close proximity between research, technological development and production. A migration of research and development consequently results in a migration of the production and vice versa. The strong collaboration within Silicon Europe has also an impact on strengthening and completing the value chain of the Semicon Europe eco-system.
The availability of a complete European semiconductor value chain is the key factor for an ability to compete globally. Without semiconductors, equipment and the know-how regarding material processing for production, none of the traditional or emerging industries such as automotive, aerospace, energy, telecommunication, and medical equipment, will remain competitive in the future. The Silicon Europe cluster will prevent Europe from losing its ability to develop and produce advanced semiconductors. Thus, the risk of producers of competitive technology products with “embedded intelligence” migrating to Asia and the dependence that comes with a foreign supply is reduced. The coordinated actions of all Silicon Europe cluster partners will provide the basis for an application-oriented research and development work with a pan-European focus. This is even more important since not a single European county can cope with the challenges posed by the growing international competition.
Silicon Europe developed a vision of indispensability for the European semiconductor industry. This leads to a significant improvement of the public awareness of the role of MNE regarding its economic (Europe´s competitiveness), scientific (securing of the production know-how for KET-relevant technologies) and social (coping with global megatrends) relevance for Europe´s future.
4.1.5 Potential impact on megatrends
Micro- and nanoelectronics is a key enabling technology which permeates through all industry and society as a whole and have a major impact on nearly every megatrend. Changes of the global ecosystem have a direct impact and are closely linked to economic, social and technical trends.
1) Impact on biosphere megatrends
Availability of resources
Raw materials, metals and fossil fuels in particular, are the basic elements of our technological live. They are not in unlimited supply on Earth.
Environmental protection, climate protection and sustainability
Global environmental pollution has further increased during the last few years despite all efforts to contain it. Only the rapidly increasing use of information and communication technology (ICT) systems has reached the CO2 emission levels of all combined civil air traffic and the energy costs for operating ICT infrastructures have become a significant financial concern.
2) Impact on social megatrends
Demographic development and social structure
Social structures are breaking up and flexibility and mobility are becoming more significant. The world´s population has been growing at an exponential rat since industrialisation began. The increasing aging of society will be especially noticeable in Europe. The demand for services in wellness, sports and culture will rise in particular. The need for professional care in nursing homes or mobile nursing services will increase significantly. The advancing technologisation and networking of the world means that people without broadband internet access are falling further behind. This phenomenon is called the digital divide and mainly affects consumption, services, communication and culture. The gap between high and low incomes is becoming greater, the number of people with incomes in between is decreasing, are further trends with an need to avoid the digital divide for all of them.
Education, knowledge and work Society is shifting from industry towards knowledge.
The new type of work in the knowledge society is constantly searching for new real and virtual workplaces. Independent creative professionals and knowledge workers who previously worked from home will have joint platforms for networking, innovation and production. They will work with fixed and flexible workstations, wireless LAN, conference and telephone rooms.
Urbanisation
In the future, 70% of people will live in cities. The cities must be built in a vertical direction in order to ensure “walkability” – pedestrian friendliness with short distances despite the increased individual space requirement. Also the trend for recentralized cities with minimal distance between work, living accommodation and leisure activities are reducing energy and space consumption, commuter flows and traffic volumes.
Mobility
The importance of mobility will continue to increase. Geographical mobility will remain an important aspect, which will be reflected in the unchanged desire for personal mobility. These will be based on new services and simple ticketing for local public transport that will not only allow smooth transitions within the system, but also easy changes from and to personal transportation systems. The quality of public transportation will be improved with simple and electronic ticketing solutions, real time information and increased travelling comfort in new, modern vehicles. A shortage of energy will make a physical mobility more and more of a luxury. Information and communication technology provides the required means of exchanging information via the internet. Telepresence and holographic systems which bring business partners together will be part of our normal life.
3) Impact on economic megatrends
Globalisation
The world will become a global village resulting in the formation of a multipolar world order and new international organizations. This takes place across national borders in a global economy managed with modern information and communication technology. This strong, technological world has a great thirst for energy.
Markets, customers and consumption
Consumption will be influenced by three trends in the coming years: The developing countries share in prosperity, the growing demands for luxury, particularly in the boom countries China, India, Russia and Brazil, and sustained consumption in the West. These trends will result in the development of new consumer markets with rapid distribution of product ranges and high growth rates in emerging markets. The time of mass production is over in the old world with its extremely well developed markets. The development here is toward individual products, specific services and high level of diversification. In shops, all product information will be stored on electronic labels, so that customers only have to pass an electronic barrier with their shopping cart and pay with card. Capturing, tracking and analysing of information in the supply chain are direct linked with efficient information and communication systems.
4) Impact on technological megatrends
Medicine and health
The divisions between individual scientific and technical disciplines are becoming increasingly blurred. New processes, products and systems with improved characteristics and functions can be created by combining different disciplines. Medical developments are characterized by a high level of technologisation with the aim of developing new diagnostic methods and therapies, optimizing health care for any aging population, and reducing costs. Electronic health cards with an intelligent information technology will be the basis for modern medicine monitoring.
Optical technologies
Next generation optical technologies like future generations of computer chips, transmission of extremely large data volumes via fiber optic cables and even display technology in everyday life and consumer electronics are strongly linked to micro- and nanoelectronic. All these modern and next generation OLED, organic LED displays, active displays in cell phones are driven by micro- and nanoelectronic devices.
Energy and environmental technology
One of the greatest challenges is the coverage of global energy requirements while preserving the environment. The use of solar energy supplemented effectively by other regenerative energies, along with hydropower, biomass and geothermal energy, wind power promises the highest growth rates. To manage this energies in order to serve the energy demand in real time, challenges the development of so called smart grids. These smart grids will be controlled and managed by monitoring systems, based on software and micro- and nanoelectronics.
Manufacturing and process technology
High quality, low costs, the ability to manufacture customer specific products while preserving the environment. A main focus in industrial manufacturing and process technology is energy efficiency. One of the hand, energy efficiency can directly reduce costs. On the other hand, efficient and environmentally-friendly measures are a quality feature especially in the energy-intensive manufacturing sector that can be marketed well against the background of current discussions on environmental protection. The future goals like the robotic sector, the man-machine interface, the collaboration between humans and machines as “colleagues”, the “digital factory”, the electronic systems, optics and sensors needed for the optimization of manufacturing processes are using modern information technology and micro- and nanoelectronics.
Digitalisation
An important aspect of digitalisation being worked on is data storage. Future data storages could be a combination of micro- and nanoelectronic technologies with durable storage media such as crystals, a combination of laser and microfilming or holography.
Information and communication technology
In the future, humans will talk to humans and objects, and objects will even talk with objects. In fact, objects are becoming ever more intelligent and can interlink with each other. The goal is to publish and share knowledge within a company so that all employees can be involved to a larger degree. This leads to increase transparency, commitment, responsibility and satisfaction. At the same time, efficiency can be increased since colleagues can contribute information and ideas that nobody would have thought of. Other trends will be remote control households via the internet, cars will exchange information with cars or the environment, 3-D television, smart textiles and quantum cryptography to secure the continuously increasing data flows. This future communication will be mainly realised with electronic mobile communication equipment based on micro- and nanoelectronic units.
Integrated, miniaturized systems
In the future, computers will enter every sphere of life. This development is described as pervasive computing. The basis for pervasive computing is the miniaturization of micro- and nanoelectronic components such as processors and sensors. These embedded systems can interlink and communicate with each other or communicate with humans. A major benefit of all these integrated systems is that they operate invisibly and unnoticeably and thus improve comfort, safety, health and therefore the quality of life of users.
4.1.6 Benefits for stakeholders
The benefits, or impact of the various activities by Silicon Europe will influence many different “stakeholders” and each stakeholder will be affected in a different way.
The most obvious stakeholder is of course the group of businesses, in particular the SMEs, in the combined clusters. They will gain easier access to knowledge and technology that previously was difficult to access combined with access to key infrastructures in the Silicon Europe regions, e.g. pilot plants, living labs, field labs etc.. Due to the enlarged meta-size of the cluster collaboration, new markets will be available and many more potential partners are at hand. A significantly raised profile will further contribute to easier establishment of business contacts. A strong focus will be put on bringing large groups closer to new SMEs and targeted connections will give rise to new technological and business relations.
Through the enlargement of the regional ecosystems to the pan-European ecosystem companies belonging to the regional cluster can have easier access to a larger network and can be easier involved in international activities to detect and generate more business opportunities.
The other significant population of the cluster are the RTOs institutes and academia. Within the combined cluster environment they will have more opportunities to support businesses but they will also have more opportunities for collaboration with peer institutes which will render a significantly higher level of innovative knowledge in a smart specialisation context. Technology transfer to SMEs through industrial contracts will also be facilitated.
Then there are of course the cluster organisations themselves. Being a partner in a world renowned collaboration will automatically lead to a significantly raised profile. Even more important, the larger pool of partners in the collaboration will give much better opportunities to support the members in the own regional cluster. Finally, playing in the premier league, automatically benchmarks the clusters’ performance leading to rapid and continuous improvement of all participating clusters.
Of course there are regional and national benefits resulting from the cluster collaboration. Increased competitiveness and export performance by key businesses is of great regional and national importance as it will give increased access to potential inward investors and an increased level of external funding utilised by the region and member state. Therefore the impact on growth of SMEs and on employment will also be mentioned.
Equity providers will benefit from the cluster collaboration through access to more possibilities to support business establishment and growth. The cluster organisations will be instrumental in bringing innovative businesses and equity providers together and supporting them in the creation of effective relations.
The cluster collaboration will be in an excellent position to provide input to the regional, national and European policy-makers that will enable them to engineer innovation and economic growth policies that are tailored to the needs of the European micro- and nanoelectronics community at large. In this context, a better understanding of the framework conditions needed by cluster organisations and their members to operate more effectively internationally is of importance as is the way to support growth of local companies possibly through investment in the local ecosystems (in a harmonised way, on a European level). Also the improved international visibility of the local ecosystems is of benefit to the policy makers in their internationalisation efforts.
End users, the parties that will enjoy the fruits of the enforced European micro- and nanoelectronics business, will find better responses to their needs due to closer continental contact between the end user and the product/technology providers that will use the MNE innovations.
Furthermore, clusters, but in particular the Silicon Europe meta-cluster collaboration, has the potential to have an indirect effect on society as a whole due to MNE’s permeation in our daily lives.
4.1.7 Assessment of the impact for each strategic theme of the JAP
For assessment of the impact for each strategic theme of the Joint Action Plan a quantitative approach has been set up and several key performance indicators were defined.
Theme 1: Knowledge and technology transfer
Cross-regional availability of knowledge and technology throughout Europe will ensure that capitalisation of the knowledge will be stretched to the maximum as no opportunity will be left aside to use the knowledge and consequent technology. How various parties will benefit from the knowledge and technology transfer effort by Silicon Europe is presented in the introduction of this chapter.
Table 10: KPI´s of knowledge and technology transfer
Theme 2: Smart specialisation
A sound Smart Specialisation implementation will provide:
• Increased cross-cluster cooperation along interregional extended value chains
• Through a continuous exchange of experiences within the Silicon Europe consortium, lessons learned will be distributed between the Silicon Europe regions on a regular basis. This will help to implement the Smart Specialisation strategies both effectively and efficiently.
• Increased alignment of regional and cross-regional projects with the individual regional Smart Specialisation strategies and therefore increased combination of H2020 and ERDF funds.
Particular to Smart Specialisation the following Key Performance Indicators (KPI’s) will give insight in the success of the chosen approaches:
Table 11: KPI´s of smart specialisation
Theme 3: SME funding
The Silicon Europe partners, as cluster organisations, play a crucial role in understanding SMEs’ needs, being their voice at local, regional, national and European levels and supporting them in having easier access to public & private funds, needed to generate business- and technological partnerships’ opportunities.
Table 12: KPI´s of SME funding
Theme 4: International business development
Today, the micro- and nanoelectronics industry is a global industry. Many of the MNE companies, whether LE or SME are part of a global value chain. This means that, in particular for high tech clusters, competition takes place not on a regional nor on a national level but on a global level. Therefore, international business development has become increasingly important to improve the competitiveness of enterprises of all sizes.
Table 13: KPI´s of international business development
Theme 5: Promotion of micro- and nanoelectronics
Efficient communication and information exchange is a key issue to link the involved clusters to public and political actors. The sustainable strengthening of the brand “Silicon Europe” and speaking with one voice in- and outside of Europe help to attract the different stakeholder groups, which benefit from promoting MNE technology will be of great benefit.
Table 14: KPI´s of promotion of MNE
4.2 Main dissemination activities and exploitations of results
Silicon Europe disseminated all results of the project by selecting the appropriate modes of communication to address the relevant stakeholders. The key messages of Silicon Europa were agreed by all partners and are summarised in the joint vision mission statement (see chapter 3.2.6). The stakeholder were invited to take part in various events to discuss the results and to provide them with relevant information. Flyers were developed to disseminate the project results. Several dissemination activities like e.g. workshops, joint booths and B2B matchmaking events have been organised (some of them in co-operation with SEMI and EEN). There were also various publications in newspapers and other medias to reach the stakeholders like industry, research and also the civil society. The publications focus on main activities like e.g. the start of the project in October 2012, the dissemination event with regional political representatives in February 2013, or the final Silicon Europe activities during Semicon Europa in October 2015.
The main dissemination activities dedicated to different target groups were:
• Creation of project website www.sillicon-europe.eu
− Main target group: civil society, scientific community, industry, policy makers, medias
− Extensive information about the project and the participating cluster including upload of Silicon Europe news and publications
• Creation of Silicon Europe image video
− Main target group: civil society, scientific community, industry, policy makers, medias
− Short video about the Silicon Europe clusters and
• Dissemination event with regional political representatives, February 20th, 2013 in Brussels
− Main target group: policy makers
− Discussion with regional representatives about the future of MNE
• Silicon Europe Clusters´ Joint Statement
− Main target group: policy makers, industry, scientific community
− Silicon Europe position paper signed by representatives of the regional governments (Rhône-Alpes, Saxony, Carinthia)
• Meeting with DG CONNECT, October 1st, 2013 in Brussels
− Main target group: policy makers
− The meeting was about the implementation of the 'European Strategy for micro-and nanoelectronics components and systems' with discussion about how Silicon Europe could contribute to the strategy and what smart specialisation could add.
• Policy Workshop November 5th, 2014 in Brussels
− Main target group: policy makers, industry, research
− Workshop on micro- and nanoelectronics and its role as key enabling technology with the support of SEMI
− Discussion on challenges and opportunities with regards to reindustrialisation of Europe
• Press Conference, October 8th, 2012 in Dresden
− Main target group: medias
− Announcing of the project start and building first relationship with the medias
• Press Conference October 6th, 2015 in Dresden
− Main target group: medias
− Publishing of the Joint Action Plan, announcement of new Silicon Europe Alliance with new board and enlarging the partnership by 6 new members after the end of the project
• Workshop European Clusters and Regions, October 7th, 2015 in Dresden
− Main target group: policy makers, industry, research
− Workshop on the role of the European clusters and regions in electronic components and systems organised by DG CONNECT and Silicon Europe
• 1st Silicon Europe Taiwan Day, September 4th, 2014 in Taipei
− Main target group: industry, research
− Half-day event during SEMICON Taiwan on enhancing transnational and cross-continental innovation presenting European competitive clusters’ know-how, experience and innovations related to electronic components and systems in Europe and the strengths of European MNE
− Organised by EBRC together with Silicon Europe
• 2nd Silicon Europe Taiwan Day, September 3rd, 2015 in Taipei
− Main target group: industry, research
− Half-day event during SEMICON Taiwan bringing together key industrial and institutional MNE players in Europe and Taiwan
It is very important to exploit the results also beyond the duration of the project. Therefore, follow up activities were already defined, e. g. participating at the following events:
− DSP Valley B2B Forum, June 2016, Leuven
− Silicon Saxony Day, July 2016, Dresden
− Semicon Taiwan, September 2016, Taipei
− Semicon Europa, October 2016, Grenoble
− Smart Systems Industry Summit, October 2016, Mechelen
Additional, a Steering Committee Meeting is scheduled for the 1st quarter of 2016. The kick off meeting of the ESCiP project will be held on 21st January in Athens.
List of Websites:
www.silicon-europe.eu
