Estratégia Europeia para as Empresas em Fase de Arranque e as Empresas em Fase de Expansão

This opinion aims to contribute in advance towards the upcoming EU policy initiatives, listed in the EC WP 2026, in the area of startups and scaleups, including the Innovation Act. It seeks to raise awareness of the regional needs and opportunities regarding finance and funding for startups and scaleups within the regional innovation ecosystems. At the same time, it will profile regional innovation ecosystems and their cooperation with industrial ecosystems as the key actors whose potential should be tapped and empowered to foster more successful startups and scaleups across the EU. The opinion will assert the CoR as a generator of policy recommendations for the work of the other EU institutions in 2026 on issues related to innovation and to startups and scaleups. It will focus inter alia on support of deep tech startups and scaleups and their retention and growth opportunities in the regions. The ultimate objective is to seek new possibilities for stronger synergies between the EU macroeconomic, research and innovation and education and skills policies at the regional level in order to boost competitiveness of startups and scaleups within the EU and beyond. This will hopefully show way forward for increased role of universities in the regional innovation ecosystems with a vieew to fostering startups and contributing towards the support to scaleups.