European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT) with its headquarters in Budapest was established in March 2008 as an independent EU body initiated by a proposal of the EC President José Manuel Barroso in spring 2005. (inspired by US Massachusetts Institute of Technology, MIT). Its main aim is to strengthen Europe’s ability to innovate with a motto Making innovation happen. Originally, it was  financed directly from EU budget, since 2014 from H2020 budget and now it is an integral part of Horizon Europe (Rules of Participation apply). Recently, a strategic plan for 7 years has been adopted: Strategic Innovation Agenda (SIA) for 2021-2027..

EIT is a unique EU initiative that drives innovation across Europe by bringing together organisations from business, education and research and find innovate solutions to pressing global challenges to create, cooperate and innovate. It supports the development of dynamic, long-term European partnerships among leading companies, research labs and higher education. These partnerships are called EIT Knowledge and Innovation Communities (KICs) and each is dedicated to finding solutions to a specific global challenge. There are currently eight KICs in operation: the first 3 were launched in 2009 (EIT Digital, EIT Climate-KIC and EIT InnoEnergy), the other 2 in 2014 (EIT Health and EIT Raw Materials, 1 KIC was created in 2016 (EIT Food) and the last 2 (EIT Urban Mobility and EIT Manufacturing) in 2019. Each KIC has its headquarters and several co-location centres that act as geographical centres for the implementation of knowledge triangle.

The EIT Regional Innovation Scheme (EIT RIS) was introduced in 2014 to advance the innovation performance of more countries and their regions across Europe, especially countries with moderate or modest innovation scores as defined by the European Innovation Scoreboard.  EIT KICs operate in these countries through dedicated Innovation Hubs. In Horizon Europe, the 8 KICs belong to European Partnerships and relevant information on their activities and services can be found under the category Across various themes.

Recordinig of the part dedicated to EIT within the Czech information campaign on Horizon Europe (10 March 2021) can be watched here and the presentation with general information on EIT is here.