Innovation Convention

The freedom of running your own company can make it easier to combine work with family. That’s according to human geneticist and entrepreneur Dr Saskia Biskup, the first-prize winner of the EU Prize for Women Innovators 2014. She is the co-founder of CeGaTGmbH, a leading German biotech company that conducts diagnostic testing for genetic diseases.

The freedom of running your own company can make it easier to combine work with family. That’s according to human geneticist and entrepreneur Dr Saskia Biskup, the first-prize winner of the EU Prize for Women Innovators 2014. She is the co-founder of CeGaTGmbH, a leading German biotech company that conducts diagnostic testing for genetic diseases.

Europe must do more to encourage a culture of entrepreneurialism if it is to keep moving forwards – that’s according to some of the participants at the Innovation Convention 2014 who were interviewed by Horizon.

Innovation must cut across all sectors, European Commission President José Manuel Barroso told the Innovation Convention 2014, an event organised by the EU to enable people to discuss new ideas.

A researcher who discovered variations in a gene involved in Parkinson’s disease received the first prize at an award for women innovators, as entrepreneurs, scientists and policymakers gathered in Brussels for the EU’s Innovation Convention 2014.

Bunker Roy is the founder and director of Barefoot College, a non-governmental organisation offering training to rural communities. He believes that establishing a sense of community, as well as a culture that encourages people to learn from failure, can help drive innovation and productivity. Roy, who was selected as one of TIME Magazine’s 100 most influential figures, will be speaking at the EU’s Innovation Convention on 10 March, 2014.

Childcare facilities and the chance for fathers to participate equally in looking after children are central measures needed to enable more women to pursue careers in science. That’s according to the inaugural EU Prize for Women Innovators winner, Dr Gitte Neubauer, who co-founded the biotechnology company Cellzome. She will be speaking at the EU’s Innovation Convention 2014 on 10 March.

Ann Mettler, the executive director of the Lisbon Council, a Brussels-based think tank, believes that Europe should create new rules for online businesses in order to give web-based entrepreneurs access to the whole of Europe. She will be participating in the EU’s Innovation Convention on 10-11 March, 2014.

Jordan Casey, a 14-year-old programmer and entrepreneur from Waterford, Ireland, believes that computer programmers should start early. Since 2012 he has founded two companies: Casey Games, a games company, and TeachWare, an app for teachers. He will be speaking at the EU’s Innovation Convention on 10 March, 2014.

Entrepreneurs need to travel to the region that specialises in their industry to have the best chance of success, according to Xavier Damman, the co-founder of online news site Storify. He will be speaking about innovation and life in Silicon Valley at the EU’s Innovation Convention on 11 March, 2014.