Annual Report of the JRC-IPTS activities within the Danube-INCO.NET project

Due to an important gap in the knowledge on the complementarity of the Danube countries' R&I strengths, the S3P Danube team's 2014-15 activities were aimed primarily at identification of the national and regional smart specialisation (S3) or simply R&I (for the non-EU countries) priorities of the Danube countries/regions and identify the common fields of R&I activities that could benefit from coordination and potential matchmaking at the macro-regional level. The purpose of this report is to briefly report about the work done on the project during the 2014-15 period and increase the knowledge on the S3 tools introduced to advance collaboration in RIS3 process, increase cooperation opportunities in R&I areas along the Danube in order to enhance transnational and inter-regional initiatives and to explore possible alignment of the Danube countries'/regions' R&I agendas in the future. Based on original data for 13 countries and 2 regions (DE) in the Danube area, the report explores opportunities of transforming complementary assets into common specialisations. Our analysis revealed 4 main fields for future collaboration: advanced materials and manufacturing (KETs), ICT, sustainable innovations, and health. These very broad priorities provide a starting point for R&I collaboration initiatives and matchmaking in the Danube macro-region.