The Strategic Technologies for Europe platform mobilizes over 15 billion euros to boost investments in Europe in its first year of operation.
Today, the Strategic Technologies for Europe (STEP) platform celebrates its first year of action in developing and manufacturing critical technologies in Europe. In the past year, STEP has pooled investment power from 11 EU programs, mobilizing over 15 billion euros to support Europes competitiveness in three strategic sectors: digital and high-tech innovation, clean and resource-efficient technologies, and biotechnologies.
The STEP portal serves as a unique platform enabling project promoters to access all STEP funding opportunities in EU programs and member states. About sixty calls for proposals have been published so far at both European and national levels, with around forty still open for submission. The STEP task force of the Commission works closely with the 27 EU member states, regularly collaborating with project promoters, managing authorities, and relevant associations to improve the setup and understand their investment needs. Building on STEPs success, President von der Leyen suggested in her letter to EU leaders before the extraordinary European Council on March 6 that STEP could be further exploited by expanding its scope to all technologies relevant to the defense sector.
STEP will continue to strengthen in 2025 with member states support for successful innovative projects and reducing dependencies in strategic technologies. Member states are encouraged to exploit STEP opportunities within the NextGenerationEU/Recovery and Resilience Fund. They can reallocate resources to STEP-labeled projects and transfer up to 6% of their envelope under the Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF) to their national component of InvestEU to finance these projects. For more information and examples of STEP-labeled projects, you can consult our online press release.
(For more information: Balazs Ujvari - Tel.: +32 2 295 45 78; Isabel Otero Barderas - Tel.: +32 2 296 69 25)