Objectives
The overarching objectives of the Joint European Forum for IPCEI (JEF-IPCEI) are to identify areas of strategic EU interest for potential future IPCEIs and to increase the effectiveness of the designing, assessment and implementation of IPCEI. The JEF-IPCEI will work towards these objectives by:
- Better aligning potential new IPCEIs with the policy objectives of the EU industrial strategy;
- Improving the process, speed, design and assessment of IPCEIs (based on existing State Aid rules) through facilitating exchanges on best practices, lessons learnt and streamlining procedural and operative framework conditions.
The JEF-IPCEI will cover the entire lifecycle of the IPCEI process and work on the following four workstreams: (1) Identification, (2) Design, (3) Assessment, and (4) Implementation and Evaluation.
Key principles
- A partnership between the Commission and Member States: The JEF-IPCEI is composed of Member State authorities and European Commission representatives. On an ad hoc basis, the JEF-IPCEI may also invite representatives from candidate countries, industry, academia and other stakeholders, only where relevant.
- A single forum co-led by Directorate General for Competition (DG COMP) and Directorate General for Internal Market, Industry, Entrepreneurship and SMEs (DG GROW): Exploiting the full potential of IPCEIs requires the combined expertise in their respective areas of DG GROW and DG COMP in a single, co-chaired forum. Other Commission services that are already or will potentially be involved in specific IPCEIs will also be invited when relevant.
- The forum is organised around two levels:
- High level: senior Member State officials responsible for economic and industrial policy (nominated by Member States) and senior officials from the European Commission.
- Technical level: Member State authorities responsible for IPCEI matters (nominated by Member States) and officials from the European Commission.
- Frequency: depending on the tasks to be addressed, the JEF-IPCEI would meet in either the technical or the high-level formation. The two levels will meet with different frequencies: potentially two (high-level) to four (technical level) meetings per year.
In the menu below, you will find more information on the participants of the JEF, the past JEF meetings and the upcoming meetings.
Adopted by the JEF-IPCEI
- Opinion of the Joint European Forum for Important Projects of Common European Interest (“JEF-IPCEI”), adopted by the high-level meeting of the Joint European Forum for IPCEI on 27 November 2024
- Recommendation of the Joint European Forum for Important Projects of Common European Interest on the roles of associated and indirect partners in an IPCEI ecosystem, adopted by the high-level meeting of the Joint European Forum for IPCEI on 27 November 2024
Upcoming JEF-IPCEI Meetings - Draft Timeline
- Q1 20256th Technical-level meeting
- Q1 20253rd High-level meeting
- Q2 20257th Technical-level meeting
- Q4 20258th Technical level meeting
- Q4 20254th High-level meeting
5th technical JEF-IPCEI meeting on 17 October 2024
On 17 October 2024, the fifth technical meeting of the Joint European Forum for IPCEI took place with the active participation of most Member States, celebrating its one-year anniversary. Different working groups presented updates and next steps regarding their respective work, followed by a preliminary discussion on the workplan for 2025, which will be further developed for the upcoming high-level meeting.
In the identification workstream, the three working groups (on Digital, Clean and Nuclear technologies) presented the current status and progress made over the past months. For the clean technologies working group, Austria presented the scope and objectives paper for a potential IPCEI on circular advanced materials for clean technologies. France presented the status of the nuclear working group, as it continues its work on identifying potential IPCEI candidates. For the Digital working group, Germany presented an outline of possible IPCEI candidates on a computing continuum for artificial intelligence and an EU-wide edge computing infrastructure and services. The Netherlands presented the ongoing work on a potential IPCEI candidate in the area of advanced semiconductor technologies. The working groups will continue their work and next steps will be discussed in the high-level meeting in November.
In the other workstreams, there were presentations on: (1) the scope and objectives of the EU IPCEI co-financing working group, (2) presentations on best practices concerning national IPCEI governance and national pre-screening of projects prior to pre-notification and (3) the current status and next steps regarding the implementation dashboard.
Finally, a GBER workshop took place, including a presentation on the application of the GBER in the context of IPCEIs, followed by brief presentations on the experience of France, the Netherlands and Slovenia, concluding with a Q&A session.
4th technical JEF-IPCEI meeting on 21 June 2024
On 21 June 2024, the fourth technical meeting of the Joint European Forum for IPCEI took place with the active participation of most Member States. The working groups set out by the forum presented their work and initial conclusions. During the discussions, the participants recalled the Council conclusions on industrial policy of 24 May 2024, namely the importance of strengthening the IPCEI as an important State aid and industrial policy instrument for the European Union. The forum discussed draft recommendations on the roles of indirect and associated partners in the IPCEI ecosystem; on national best practices, in particular on the national assessment framework for participating in an IPCEI and on the national calls for expression of interest; as well as on common reporting metrics to create an IPCEI implementation dashboard. Furthermore, France presented the state of play of the preparations for the proposed second IPCEI on health (Tech4Cure), focusing on medical devices, which is currently in the design phase. Additionally, the working groups focusing on identifying new technologies/important infrastructures suitable for possible IPCEIs shared their preliminary findings. These areas included:
- Digital technologies: advanced AI/ML technologies, advanced semiconductor technologies, next generation compute infrastructure technologies;
- Advanced materials for clean technologies (energy, mobility, and electronics);
- Nuclear technologies.
The forum will now assess in depth the feasibility and added value of possible IPCEIs for these new technologies/important infrastructures. Where appropriate, the working groups will consult stakeholders such as industry and academic experts.
In addition, the forum took stock of initiatives directed at the Forum by stakeholders, such as industry and scientific community, and, where relevant, will engage in further discussion and consideration.
3rd technical JEF-IPCEI meeting on 18 April 2024
On 18 April 2024, the third technical meeting of the Joint European Forum for IPCEI took place with the active participation of most Member States. The meeting focused on the progress made by working groups on the topics of indirect and associated partners and national best practices in IPCEIs, including presentations from Germany and Hungary. Furthermore, the Commission presented the rationale, general principles, functioning, and implementation of the claw-back mechanism, including a Q&A session. Ultimately, further discussions took place on the identification of new candidate technologies for potential future IPCEIs in the areas endorsed by the high-level formation of the forum.
2nd technical JEF-IPCEI meeting on 26 January 2024
On 26 January 2024, the second technical meeting of the Joint European Forum for IPCEI took place with the active participation and contribution of the majority of Member States. During the meeting, the timeline of the JEF-IPCEI meetings for 2024 and the 2024 workplan were presented and approved at technical level. The Member States were invited to express their interest in leading and participating in working groups within the JEF-IPCEI. Moreover, the JEF-IPCEI agreed for developing a common methodology to evaluate and identify new candidate technologies or infrastructures potentially relevant for an IPCEI. Member States were invited to propose and discuss potential candidate technologies. The Netherlands presented a dedicated framework it has developed across ministries to assess the relevance of their participation in IPCEIs.
1st technical JEF-IPCEI meeting on 20 October 2023
On 20 October 2023 the first technical meeting of the Joint European Forum for IPCEI took place with participants from almost all Member States. Member States shared their strong support for the forum and emphasized the need for increased cooperation between Member States and between Member States and the Commission on IPCEIs. During the meeting, the structure and goals of the JEF were discussed. DG COMP presented various ways in which it improved the facilitation of IPCEI procedures (i.e., the Code of good practices for a transparent, inclusive, faster design and assessment of IPCEIs and the standardized IPCEI Project Portfolio Template). Two Member States (France and Austria) presented their experiences in IPCEIs and pointed to various potential areas for improvement. DG GROW chaired a discussion on how to improve the implementation of IPCEIs.
2nd high-level meeting of the JEF-IPCEI on 27 November 2024
The high-level formation of the Joint European Forum for Important Projects of Common European Interest (JEF-IPCEI) convened on 27 November 2024 to take stock of the work done in the last months. Executive Vice President Margrethe Vestager attended the meeting, thanking Member States for their engagement, highlighting the approval of 10 IPCEIs during the last six years unlocking investments of over EU 100 billion for European strategic value chains and underscoring the Forum’s critical role in identifying new IPCEI candidates and in promoting strategic collaboration across the EU [link].
The Forum endorsed four proposed IPCEI candidates in clean and digital technologies: Circular Advanced Materials for Clean Technologies, Continuum of federated and distributed Artificial Intelligence services, Advanced Semiconductors Technologies, and Deploying large-scale federated Edge Computing Infrastructure and Services. Member states will now start working on the design of these 4 potential IPCEIs with the support of the Commission, outside of the JEF-IPCEI.
The Forum also adopted its first Opinion and a number of recommendations, taking stock of one year of technical work conducted by Member States and the Commission together. The recommendations cover the role of indirect and associated partners in an IPCEI and the identification of national best practices in key phases of the IPCEI process at national level, which will be published once the collection of all national best practices will have been finalised. Once implemented by the Member States, these recommendations and guidance will streamline the IPCEI process, facilitate cooperation between Member States and the Commission and contribute to speed the adoption of new IPCEIs.
The Forum also agreed on an ambitious workplan for 2025 to further increase the effectiveness of the instrument and to speed its implementation. In the identification workstream, the work on nuclear technologies will continue in 2025. The Forum agreed to pre-assess the new following technologies for potential IPCEIs : biotechnologies, critical raw materials and clean, connected and autonomous vehicles. In the other workstreams, work will continue on options for EU IPCEI co-financing, implementation and national best practices. New areas of work for 2025 will cover facilitating the participation of SMEs, Member States’ management of IPCEIs, and an evaluation methodology.
1st high-level meeting of the JEF-IPCEI on 7 March
A successful first high-level meeting of the Joint European Forum for Important Projects of Common European Interest (JEF-IPCEI) took place on the 7th of March in Brussels, co-chaired by Kerstin Jorna, Director General for Internal Market, Industry, Entrepreneurship and SMEs and Olivier Guersent, Director General for Competition in the European Commission. The meeting was attended by representatives of all EU Member States and Norway. During the discussions, the high-level representatives agreed to the JEF-IPCEI work plan for 2024, aiming for concrete results by the end of the year. Building on the work done by the technical experts since the set-up of the JEF-IPCEI in October 2023, the high-level formation approved the methodology for identification of potential new candidate technologies or infrastructures for future IPCEIs. Technology areas for pilot assessment have been identified, among which, clean, digital and nuclear technologies, as well as biotechnologies and advanced materials. The member State authorities and the Commission services will now continue the collaborative work on implementing the work plan to increase the effectiveness of the IPCEI process and identify potential new IPCEIs.