The business impact of India in the EU

It is of utmost importance that the views of the business and policy communities from both sides are represented in a constructive negotiation process. The EU-India Trade and Investment Agreement is still under negotiation. After the EU-India Summit in March 2016, some steps have been taken from both sides to improve the collaboration but still a lot needs to be done to reach a successful conclusion of the deal. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has launched more than thirty schemes to modernise India since taking office. Among these, several touch upon key sectors in both countries, including climate change, urbanisation, innovation and technology transfer, energy and water management. Europe enjoys great expertise in these sectors, as demonstrated by its SMEs' continuous development of new technologies. EUROCHAMBRES' experience shows that much of this know-how can be highly beneficial to Indian enterprises in the same sectors. It is of utmost importance that the views of the business and policy communities from both sides are represented in a constructive negotiation process. The creation of a common action plan that accompanies trade negotiations encourages the business community to pave the way for a constructive dialogue and thus contributes to smoother EU-India trade and investment relations. India is one of the fastest growing economies and is currently attracting ever more foreign investors. The European Union ranks first on the list of countries per number of investors in India. The potential of the Agreement as a tool of enhancing European economy is clear and although negotiations between the two blocs have at times proved difficult, we must renew our efforts for an agreement to be reached. Drawing from our management experience of the European Business and Technology Centre (EBTC) assisting European companies and research centres in entering the Indian market, EUROCHAMBRES can testify that European small and medium enterprises (SMEs) are not waiting for a trade and investment agreement before doing business with India but the conclusion of the Agreement would ensure a more favourable environment in which companies can operate. In the field of Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) protection, EBTC has established an IPR helpdesk with the support of the European Patent Office (EPO). The main aim of the EBTC IPR Helpdesk is to facilitate and assist European companies in protecting invention in India, identify issues related to market access, public procurement, competition law and coordinates with other European organisations to build IPR capacity in India including advocating with the relevant authorities on IPR issues and challenges. In the IPR sector, a good collaboration has been established also with the Indian Government. For example the 4th Indo-European conference on patents and ICT, hosted by the EPO and the Indian Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, in association with EBTC and the Centre for Development of Advanced Computing, will take place on 9 December in Munich and will explore the opportunities and challenges of Industry 4.0 for the patent systems in Europe and India. Both regions are among the trailblazers in the ICT sector, as their respective industries are highly inventive and competitive on a global scale. A lot can be gained if both the EU and Indian side will collaborate further and, if at policy level the relevant actors are not taking the lead, the businesses will. Arnaldo Abruzzini is the CEO of EUROCHAMBRES - the Association of European Chambers of Commerce and Industry represents over 20 million enterprises in Europe - www.eurochambres.eu