To help Europe’s youth seize the best job opportunities generated through digital technology, the European Commission will deliver an awareness raising campaign from 26-30 March 2012. The European e-Skills Week seeks to address how we can reduce youth unemployment – which has peaked at over 40% in some member states and is generally at around 22% across the EU – through obtaining the right types of e-Skills for the digital economy.

Communications, journalism and audio visual students or recent graduates from universities across the EU are invited to participate in the European e-Skills Week Project Passion Competition. Project Passion is a fun and potentially career launching initiative designed to inspire young people to create exciting communications on a theme that is top of mind amongst all young graduates in Europe – how to win a job.

We are inviting leading schools in the communications and audio visual domains to send entries which will be judged by a panel of experts from INSEAD, London School of Economics and the Sorbonne and a panel of industry leaders including the Chairmain of TBWA Worldwide, EuroNews, Cisco, Nokia, Google and Microsoft. Prizes include cash for the winner and runners up in each category, and the opportunity to win internships in leading global companies.

All you need to enter Project Passion is excellent content in one of three categoriees outlined below. You need to show in a creative, innovative, quirky or humourous way how young people can find jobs through selecting technology oriented careers.

The e-Skills Week Project Passion Competition is open to all final year students and recent graduates from across Europe who have studied communication, media, design, journalism or digital technology. We are seeking creative novel and cool communications campaigns based on the theme of the European e-Skills 2012 campaign – e-Skills: there is a job waiting for you.

The e-skills Week Project Passion Competition presents an extraordinary opportunity for students to demonstrate their skill in the creation of cutting edge messages that build the profile and visibility of the European e-Skills Week campaign. It also offers students the opportunity to build their own professional visibility with the biggest and best companies in the world.

To know more about how to enter or to share this information with your network check out our website where you can download the competition information and pass on the news !

Wishing you all a very merry holiday season from DIGITALEUROPE and the #eskills2012 campaign organisers

In a bid to help Europe – and most especially Europe’s youth – seize the best opportunities for jobs generated through digital technologies, DIGITALEUROPE and European Schoolnet have joined forces with the European Commission – DG Enterprise and Industry – to organise a European e-Skills Week in 2012 on 26-30 March 2012.

Youth unemployment, has peaked at over 40%, and is a worrying trend. Meanwhile opportunities created through science, information and communication technology, engineering and maths are critical to building a modern workforce. The European e-Skills week 2012 is a grass roots campaign focused on showing people how to get jobs and e-skills for life in the digital age.

Industry partners – including leading ICT companies such as Nokia, Microsoft, Cisco, Intel and numerous SMEs across Europe – in partnership with education bodies and public authorities, will deliver a large and diverse programme of events and activities in more than 30 European countries. Ministries of Education have embraced the importance of ICT and are working with industry to deliver an exciting choice of options for people looking for work, and for young people thinking about what career options are open to them.

“SMEs can only grow through employing highly skilled people,” outlined Dr Erkki Ormala, DIGITALEUROPE President. “The right skills encourage innovation and entrepreneurship. We cannot over-estimate the role of digital technology in job generation,” he said.

“The European e-Skills Week is a great initiative for you to get involved in to learn more about the skills you need to find a job,” said Marc Durando, Executive Director of European Schoolnet. “ICT is not just programming; there are so many options to be had from using technology creatively. Some of the greatest jobs can be found through technology – imagine the world without Twitter or Facebook, which were built out of a passion for technology,” said Mr. Durando.

Industry research from IDC estimates that 90% of all jobs will involve basic level of e-skills by 2015. Addressing this key challenge – skills for jobs for growth over the next few years – is a critical issue. Public-private partnerships with large companies have recognised the importance of having more people involved in a digital life, both for pleasure and for work.

The first European e-Skills week delivered hundreds events and activities in March 2010 that raised awareness amongst 65 million citizens in 35 countries of the importance of gaining e-Skills for jobs and for life.

Preparatory work for the European e-Skills Week 2012 will commence in December 2011 and activities will continue up until May 2012. Options for education, training, and opportunities for jobs and growth will be a highlight, and will demonstrate why ICT is so important for any new job.

To join the fight against unemployment citizens, companies and governments are invited engage in the European e-Skills Week 2012. To help deliver e-skills for jobs and for life check out http://eskills-week.ec.europa.eu and find ways to build our digital future together.

President of DIGITALEUROPE, Dr Erkki Ormala, writes about the European Digital Agenda for neurope:

Europe is at a cross road. In the climate of a continuing fiscal crisis most of our energy is focused on short-term fiscal consolidation. This issue must be resolved in an appropriate way to restore macroeconomic stability which ultimately is a precondition for growth and prosperity in Europe.

At the same time a digital revolution is sweeping societies and businesses across the globe. Countries which have been quick to respond are enjoying the benefits and making their way to the top of world rankings. Emerging economies are a case in point; their impressive positive growth figures can be attributed to their willingness to embrace this digitally driven revolution. Europe too has a window of opportunity to capitalise on the growth potential embedded in this digitally driven revolution.

Investing in innovation is a prerequisite for harnessing Europe’s growth potential and ensuring macro-economic stability. DIGITALEUROPE applauds the European Commission for its foresight in responding to this need through flaship initiatives like the Innovation Union, a highlight of the Barroso II Presidency. The Innovation Union acknowledges that the creation of a competitive innovative ICT industry sector is a corner stone of job creation and long term economic dividends in the EU. DIGITALEUROPE shares the European Commission’s view that there is a need to focus EU innovation on the Grand Challenges, but we are also conscious that the greatest challenge of all in Europe is to restore economic growth.

Please follow this link to read the full article about the European Digital Agenda.

Your Excellencies,

We write to thank you and the French Presidency of the G-8 for making the Digital Economy a high priority this week. The importance of your deliberations cannot be overestimated.

Around the world digital sectors of the economy are growing faster than the rest. As the economies you represent struggle to renew growth and employment, it is vital to recognise that digital infrastructure investment, new internet-based services, and the digital transformation of every economic sector have become the most powerful drivers of economic growth and innovation. Europe itself presents compelling examples:

In France, the digital economy represented 20% of overall growth from 2004-2009, adding €60 billion to GDP and 1 million jobs.

In Germany, investment in ICT and the Internet contributed 23% to productivity and GDP growth from 1999 through 2007. The ICT/Internet sector is Germany’s second biggest employer, providing 850.000 jobs.

In Italy in 2010, Internet’s contribution to GDP was €31.5 billion, or 2% of total GDP, and is expected to grow at an annual rate of 18%.

The UK Internet economy is worth £100 billion a year, and is growing at 10% per year; the Internet directly employs 250.000 people.

For the EU 27, research concludes that eliminating barriers to the expansion of the digital economy based on the free flow of information and knowledge could deliver 4% GDP growth by 2020, a gain of €500 billion and similar in scale to the growth dividend achieved as a result of the EU’s historic programme launched over two decades ago to complete its single market by 1992.

We are only at the beginning of this transformation in our developed economies, while there is likewise increasingly rapid uptake and penetration of these technologies in many emerging economies. Harnessing this vast new global growth potential now requires political leadership to avoid stifling regulatory fragmentation of digitally-driven communities, industries and markets. The internet is global. No single sovereign state – or political union – can exploit its full growth potential in isolation.

As you consider the priorities for your common digital agenda, we offer the following observations for reflection:

The digital revolution creates entirely new ways for each one of us to behave as individuals, as economic actors and as citizens in our relationship with government. There is potential for wider social progress and economic growth in all three of these spheres as innovative digital tools and services enlarge the opportunities and help reduce the risks inherent in each. Public policies now need to focus on reinforcing these same effects.

The digital revolution is generational. Already today in Europe, 73% of 16-24 year olds are ‘digital natives,’ born into the digital world over the past 20 years, while many emerging economies are younger and at least as digitally native. These rapidly growing, digitally skilled generations are the fastest adopters of new consumer-empowering solutions and other digital tools which challenge the old economic order. Their future economic opportunity, employment, and level of civic engagement will depend crucially on the ability of today’s leaders to put in place the policies and regulatory frameworks needed to accelerate the digital transformation of our economies. This is by far the most important legacy we can leave.

The digital paradigm creates entirely new business models which in turn generate new jobs. Global youth unemployment has reached its highest level on record, increasing from 11.9 percent in 2007 to 13.0 percent in 2009. We have been slow to leverage the job-creating power of digital technology. We must now seize the employment opportunities as the Internet becomes as essential to enterprises around the world as social networks have become for citizens. Here again, public policies need to support the rapid emergence of this “Business Web”, disruptive though it may be.

Each region of the world will implement its own digital agenda reflecting its specific circumstances. Such diversity nevertheless requires a common commitment to transparent, technology-neutral and compatible regulatory frameworks, or we risk market fragmentation (as exemplified by the way data privacy and intellectual property rules are still handled within the EU) that deprives us all of the benefits of market integration and global economies of scale.

In view of what is at stake, we urge you to act decisively this week (and later this year in the framework of the G-20) to promote integration and avoid fragmentation of digitally-driven markets and industries at national and global level.

Please be assured that DIGITALEUROPE members, who represent the world’s largest ICT organisations and small to medium size enterprises across the EU, are committed to active, constructive and transparent engagement in public policy process at all levels in order to harness the growth opportunities and overcome the challenges that are holding back the revolution that our technologies are driving.

Sincerely,

Dr. Erkki Ormala,
President, DIGITALEUROPE

Bridget P. Cosgrave
Director-General, DIGITALEUROPE

Chief Executive Officers/Presidents, Corporate Membership of DIGITALEUROPE

Ulf Wahlberg, DIGITALEUROPE Executive Board Member, (Ericsson) talks about the importance of the Digital Single Market and Spectrum as a critical priorities in delivering a pan European approach to the digital age.

The launch of the Digital Agenda by Commissioner Kroes in May this year marked an important milestone Europe’s evolution towards a fully functiong digital economy of the 21st Century.

John Higgins, DIGITALEUROPE Board Member (IntellectUK), explains the importance of using trade associations to present key messages of the Digital Agenda across member states to ensure maximum uptake of the opportunities available. 

As a cross sector enabler digital technology has the potential to deliver jobs, and productivity growth across all sectors of the economy.

For more information go to digitaleurope.org

It is estimated that 90% of all jobs will require digital skills by the year 2015.  The ICT sector will require nearly 400,000 skilled professionals by the same year. e-Skills are the foundation of an innovative, entreprenerial and competitive European society in the 21st Century, but only if we invest in skills today.

In this short video interview, DIGITALEUROPE Board Member, John Vassallo of Microsoft outlines why e-skills are the backbone of European computing technology, and an essential building block of the Digital Agenda .

Dr Erkki Ormala, President of Digital Europe (Nokia), explains why we need to face the challenges of competing in the digital age head on and deliver growth, jobs and a fully operational Digital Single Market.

Dr Ormala points to reform of the current copyright levies regime as a being critical priority for Europe.

For more information go to digitaleurope.org

DIGITALEUROPE’s Board highlights the importance of the Digital Agenda to Europe in a series of pointed interviews in the lead up to the Digital Assembly due to take place in June 2011.

#mce_temp_url#The second European Innovation Summit took place in Brussels last week (11-14 October) at the European Parliament, and gathered an impressive audience of European Industry elites and political leaders.

The key theme of the event focussed on how innovation, through the pooling of forces, can deliver benefits for European society and tackle important societal issues. The summit was opened with the session by the Vice-President of the European Parliament Silvana Koch-Mehrin.

Commissioner Androulla Vassilio made interesting remarks on the subject stating, “the response to the main societal challenges we are facing depends on the capacity of young people to adapt in a fast changing society and to be innovative.”

Peter Grünberg, pioneer in hard drive storage technology, European Inventor of the Year 2006 and Nobel Prize Laureate in Physics 2007 contributed with a personal account on his fascination with physics and emphasised the relevance of innovation in all areas of life.

A panel session called “Europe’s Innovation Challenge”, focussed on European Commission’s proposal on the “Innovation Union” was presented by Anneli Pauli, Deputy Director General of DG Research and Innovation of the European Commission. President of DIGITALEUROPE Erkki Ormala joined in the panel discussion which debated the vital importance of involving all parts of society in building a culture of innovation. The panel agreed that citizens, industry, educators and political decision makers each have an important role to play in first committing to the notion of innovation, and second implementing innovative practise into daily life.

Michael Praet (Cabinet of the European Council President Herman Van Rompuy), Luuk Borg (EUREKA), Erika Mann (RSFF) , Richard Granger (Technology Partners), Gernot Klotz (CEFIC), Christopher Hull (EARTO), Richard Straub (EFMD) and Ferenc Szakács (CASON Kft) joined in the panel discussion.

For more details go to Innovation Summit and DIGITALEUROPE