EC Launches Standards-Setting Policy to Counter Foreign Influence
Europe must boost its world-leading role in telecom and technical standard-setting by addressing the growing challenge from China, the U.S. and other non-European players, Internal Market Commissioner Thierry Breton said at a Wednesday briefing. The European Commission unveiled a standardization…
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
Communications Daily is required reading for senior executives at top telecom corporations, law firms, lobbying organizations, associations and government agencies (including the FCC). Join them today!
strategy and proposed changes to the regulation. The approach "aims to strengthen the EU's global competitiveness, to enable a resilient, green and digital economy and to enshrine democratic values in technology applications." EU wants to ensure its leadership in several areas, including semiconductors, and to create a Europe more open to new opportunities, Breton said. Some standards bodies, such as the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI), European Committee for Standardization (CEN) and European Electrotechnical Committee for Standardization (CENELEC), have "European" in their names, but large numbers of non-European groups with voting rights unduly influenced their work, he said. The new strategy will ensure that standards meet EU needs and political strategies, and will focus on how standards bodies are governed. It will examine Europe's global leadership in international standards organizations such as ITU, and it calls for more attention to research and innovation and on encouraging skills to attract people to the field. Asked for an example of where standards were defined under pressure from non-European players, Breton cited a 2020 ETSI proposal, nixed by U.S. and Chinese companies, to set standards to ensure the compatibility of smartphones in Europe with the Galileo global navigation satellite system. Breton stressed the EU standards and rules in place for different sectors won't change but will become more visible. The problem isn't that European enterprises haven't been innovative enough, it's that "we've been too naive": Europe has always had an open standards-setting process under the belief that openness would entice companies to set up in Europe. However, he said, "we can't be open at any price." Europe needs faster approval for new standards, more inclusiveness and a clearer definition of the EC's role in the industry-led standardization process, said European Parliament Internal Market Committee Chair Anna Cavazzini, of the Greens/European Free Alliance and Germany. CEN and CENELEC cheered the strategy.