Cutting red tape is the right way

To survive and prosper, small, innovative companies need administrative burdens to be lightened.

In your article “Commission hopes to cut red tape for researchers” (22-28 April), you highlighted the European Commission’s ideas to reduce the administrative burden in the area of research and development. 

Efforts to reduce red tape are welcomed by those who, like our members, work in innovative industries in which most companies are small. Regulatory costs and administrative burdens currently associated with the funding of research projects have a disproportionate effect on small companies. The effects are particularly pronounced when those SMEs operate in a highly competitive international market.

All of these are characteristics of the semi-conductors industry, the second-most R&D-intensive EU industry after biotechnology.

In a tough international market like ours, over-regulation can determine a company’s survival. That should worry the Commission, which in a communication on key enabling technologies published in September 2009, listed semi-conductors as strategic for Europe, in part because of their wide application and in part because they enable innovation and value creation in a large part of the European economy.

The entire supply chain would function better if SMEs were able to compete fairly with large companies, while lower costs would allow them to compete internationally and invest more in R&D. The ‘system’ needs to be designed with these aims in mind.

 

From:

Carlos Lee

SEMI Europe

Brussels