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Eleven-nation line-up for European Inventor of the Year awards

Munich/Brussels, 7 April 2006

An international jury chaired by former Dutch Prime Minister Wim Kok has nominated inventors from eleven nations for the title of "European Inventor of the Year". The nominees represent nine different countries in Europe, plus Australia and the USA. This new prize for innovation, the joint brainchild of the European Commission and the European Patent Office (EPO), is to be awarded on 3 May at a ceremony in the Autoworld Museum in Brussels. The winners will be honoured by Commission Vice–President and Enterprise and Industry Commissioner Günter Verheugen and EPO President Alain Pompidou.

Commission Vice‑President Verheugen stresses the distinctly European flavour of the nominations: "The jury's choice shows there is a good basis for leading-edge technology in Europe. With the partnership for growth and employment we aim to strengthen this potential and thereby bolster Europe's competitiveness."

As President Pompidou puts it: "The panel's selection is clear evidence that major R&D achievements, especially in marketable high-tech fields, are nowadays primarily the result of teamwork and co‑operation. Obtaining patent protection for this research is a key to successful product marketing."

The background to the awards is the European Union's and the EPO's drive to strengthen Europe's position as a dynamic centre for science and innovation in the context of the EU's Lisbon Agenda.

The list the jury has drawn up covers inventions from all the fields of technology in which the EPO granted European patents between 1991 and 2000. It granted over 380 000 patents in that period, so in making their choice the jurors drew on the technical expertise of the Office's 3 500 patent examiners. Prizes are to be awarded in six categories, and three candidates have been nominated for each of them.

ost of the nominations were for progressive contributions and innovations in information technology, telecommunications and medicine. There are lifetime achievement nominations for Karlheinz Brandenburg ( Germany), inventor of the MP3 format, for James Dyson (UK), developer of the vacuum cleaner principle that bears his name, and for Federico Faggin ( Italy), "father" of the microchip.

In the majority of cases the nominations went to teams rather than to individuals.

The European Inventor of the Year jury is chaired by Wim Kok and also features Gilles Capart (Belgium), Chairman of PROTON Europe, Dimitri Dimitriou (Great Britain), CEO of DyoDelta Biosciences, Leif Edvinsson (Sweden), Professor for Intellectual Capital, Robert Peugeot (France), Executive Vice-President of PSA Peugeot-Citroën, Maive Rute (Estonia), the Deputy European Commission's SME Envoy, and Paul Rübig (Austria), Member of the European Parliament.

Further information on the candidates and the awards ceremony in the Autoworld Museum and notes on accreditation for media representatives wishing to attend the event can be found at www.european-inventor.org. 

Contact:

European Patent Office
Press Office
Rainer Osterwalder
80298 Munich
Telephone: +4989/2399-1821
press@epo.org

European Commission
Gregor Kreuzhuber
Tel.: +322/2966565
Fax: +322/2963038