Huawei Holds European Innovation Day in Paris

Working with local partners to drive innovation

PARIS, Oct. 17, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Huawei hosted European Innovation Day 2022 today in Paris, under the theme of 'Open Innovation for a Sustainable Europe'. The event brought together innovators from around the world who are working on building a "Digital Europe" and exploring how digital technology can be used to protect the environment.

The agenda kicked off with a keynote from MEP Ardiana Maldonado, who discussed "Innovation as Our Best Tool for Future Global Challenges, where she stressed how Europe urgently needs digital innovation to meet future challenges. She also called for the creation of a truly open ecosystem where enterprises, startups, academia and policymakers can work together to ensure that Europe continues to lead the charge in the coming years.

Gaël Blondelle, VP of Ecosystem development at Eclipse Foundation, one of the biggest open-source communities in the EU, also delivered a presentation advocating open-source solutions to the innovation challenges Europe currently faces, and Dario Rossi, Director of A14NET Lab & DataCom Lab at Huawei's Paris Research Centre discussed how Huawei is contributing to science and innovation in France and Europe.

An open ecosystem powered by digital technologies can accelerate Europe's growth

Rainer Terlutter, VP of Industry Solutions for Empolis Information Management, spoke at the event on why innovation in digital technologies is so important to Europe, saying, "Smart products and services based on artificial intelligence and smart knowledge are the engine of digitization."

David Chquiry, CEO & Founder of Green Tech Innovations also added that, "By working together, we can use edge computing and other new technologies to create solutions that are green by design."

A particularly compelling feature of Innovation Day 2022 was the startups and future leaders who shared their own successful stories. For example, Jake Phillips, Director of Ecosystem Development at an internationally recognized start-up community Dogpatch Labs, introduced their company's ecosystem and highlighted the innovation and job growth potential it will bring. He shared how 2021 had been a landmark year for investment in unicorns in Europe, with start-ups having entered a hyper-growth phase. He also touched on their work in driving positive policy initiatives that allow start-ups to unleash their potential. 

Atul Shrivijay Athavale, Huawei Cloud WEU's Head of Cloud Ecosystem, then announced the official launch of the Huawei Cloud Startup Program and Huawei Cloud Developer Competition in Europe, as part of Huawei Cloud's commitment to working with partners to build an innovative startup and developer ecosystem.

A green and sustainable Europe is closely linked with digital technology

Three more speakers included the Porini Foundation's CTO Toni Caradonna, the Center for Conservation Action's Head of Protected and Conserved Areas James Hardcastle, and Rainforest Connection CEO, Bourhan Yassin, who jointly called for building a greener and more environment-friendly Europe with innovative digital technologies.

Huawei continues its contribution to Europe

Participants were then treated to a presentation by Dr Basalisco, Director of Copenhagen Economics, who shared the key findings within a study published on the 17th of October. The study demonstrated Huawei's economic contribution to Europe in 2021, which is significant in value-added, jobs supported and European tax revenues. Huawei also contributed significantly to research and innovation, talent cultivation, sustainable development, and social and digital inclusion in Europe.

In his closing remarks for Innovation Day 2022, Huawei's VP of Corporate Communications, Karl Song shared a few real-life examples of how Huawei is contributing to digital, intelligent, and green development both in Europe and around the world, said, "We will always be committed to the digital transformation of French and European SMEs and the creation of a more digital Europe."