Sir, At the Association for Competitive Technology (ACT) we have been relentlessly fighting for a Community patent for the past five years. We’re happy to see UEAPME joining us in carrying the flag for this important cause. Innovative SMEs can only benefit from the improvements that a one-stop shop for patent protection across Europe would [...]

Sir, The big banks, which caused the current recession, refuse to take responsibility to date. By calculating excessively high interest rates, the economic recovery is being blocked. EuropeanCompanyMarket has found that the negative sentiment is fortunately decreasing. The number of visitors on the website www.E-cm.eu is increasing. People from all over Europe are interested in [...]

Sir, Regarding ‘MEP: Use procurement process to ‘leverage innovation’‘: On behalf of small business innovators across Europe, I would like to congratulate MEP Malcolm Harbour for his success in getting through his report on pre-commercial procurement. This is a fine example of the ‘think small first’ principle put into action. Traditionally, SMEs have shied away [...]

Open letter to the newly appointed trade commissioner, Baroness Catherine Ashton BusinessEurope out of Charlemagne now! Baroness Ashton, welcome to your new position as EU trade commissioner. I am hopeful that we will be able to collaborate successfully, especially on environmental and global justice issues. During the autumn of 2006 your predecessor, Peter Mandelson, presented [...]

Monsieur, Admirateur au départ, partisan inconditionnel ensuite, je suis obligé de constater qu’en 20 ans, l’Europe n’a pas avancé « uniquement » dans le nombre des pays « incorporés » à l’Union des Marchés, que certain pays ont ignorés d’ailleurs. En effet, si l’UE aurait pu croire un instant aux PME-PMI, elle aurait déjà fait [...]

Sir, The European Union (EU) is due to publish its long-awaited ‘Communication on Regional Integration in ACP countries’ soon. The document represents a welcome update of the EU’s strategy of supporting regional integration worldwide, last laid out extensively in 1995. In the intervening years, regional integration has leapt to the forefront of the global agenda, [...]

Sir, Regarding ‘EU seeks to shift freight to rail and shipping’: The pro-’Gigaliners’ lobby is arguing that the possible admission onto European roads of trucks of up to 25.25m long and weighing up to 60 tonnes would provide an increase in freight capacity while reducing transport costs. But are these supposed advantages real? In fact, [...]