BRUSSELS (Bloomberg) -- The European Union approved research initiatives worth 9.3 billion euros (13.8 billion dollars) for electronics, computers, medicines, and airplanes, the first EU programs of their kind to be funded by governments and industry.

EU research ministers endorsed a 3-billion-euro program to spur the development of tiny electronics, or nanotechnology; a 2.7-billion-euro computer project; a 2-billion-euro medicines initiative, and a 1.6-billion-euro plan for cleaner and quieter aircraft. Companies would fund as much as 60 percent.
These unprecedented EU public-private partnerships in research and development aim to help the bloc raise R&D spending to 3 percent of gross domestic product from 1.8 percent and bridge the gap with the U.S. and Japan. The goal is to overcome fragmentation in Europe by concentrating EU funds and enticing companies to invest more.
“We have to join forces in a specific way if we want to be competitive,” EU Research Commissioner Janez Potocnik told reporters after national ministers approved the four programs at a meeting in Brussels. “It's a quantitative step forward.”
The EU wants to overcome stagnation in R&D spending to boost economic growth that has trailed the U.S. pace most of the past decade and reduce unemployment of around 7 percent. As part of this effort, the ministers also approved the creation of a European technology institute that will bring together research groups, universities, and companies.
--------------- Too slow
Europe is too slow to turn cutting-edge technologies into marketable goods, say EU leaders including Jose Barroso, president of the European Commission, the bloc's executive arm which proposed the research programs earlier this year and the technology institute in 2006.
Potocnik dismissed the possibility that the same troubles could afflict the four research programs, saying they are industry-driven.
------------- Failure-proof “It's a bottom-up, business initiative which we've topped with public money,” he said. “Private investment was there well before public investment. I do not see any possibility of failure.”
The nanotechnology research program is due to be 60 percent financed by companies including STMicroelectronics NV, Infineon Technologies AG, and NXP BV, and 40 percent funded by the EU and national governments over six years. The computer program is supposed to be 60 percent funded by companies such as Royal Philips Electronics NV and Nokia Oyj, with the rest coming from national and EU coffers.
The medicines initiative aims to attract 50 percent funding from companies such as GlaxoSmithKline Plc., Roche Holding AG, and Eli Lilly & Co., and the aircraft project is due to be 50 percent financed by companies including Airbus SAS and Rolls-Royce Group Plc. The public funding for the medicines and aircraft programs is due to come only from the EU budget.
The EU also plans a 940 million-euro research initiative to promote the development of hydrogen-powered cars, seeking to reduce air pollution and reliance on imported oil. Government ministers are due to make a decision next year on this program, which would be 50 percent financed by companies such as Royal Dutch Shell Plc. and Bayerische Motoren Werke AG, and 50 percent funded by the EU over six years.