published Oct 26th 2016, 5:11 am, by Ewa Krukowska

(Bloomberg) —
The European Union adopted a plan to keep a leading place in the increasingly competitive global space industry by encouraging companies to make use of its cutting-edge satellite data set to become indispensable in areas from producing driverless cars to monitoring climate change.

The European Commission, the regulatory arm of the 28-nation EU, wants to promote the creation of industrial space hubs and help start-ups gain a foothold in the region’s space industry. The Space Strategy for Europe also highlights the need for the region to develop autonomous access to space through building its own launchers.

“Space matters for Europe; each euro invested in space brings back 7 euros,” EU Industry Commissioner Elzbieta Bienkowska said. “Public finance is there. With this strategy we want to attract and foster greater involvement of the private sector.”

Europe has earmarked 12 billion euros for high-quality space projects in 2014-2020. Its Copernicus Earth-observation program provides data used to better manage crops, conduct search-and-rescue operations and respond to natural disasters. The Galileo global satellite navigation system is set to improve positioning and timing information for driverless cars, railways and planes.

The commission estimates that around 6 percent of the EU’s gross domestic product depends on space technologies, including global positioning systems and navigation. With the new strategy, the bloc wants to move from developing infrastructure to encouraging companies to use the data, crunch the numbers and turn their knowledge into profit.

“The EU is a key player in space policy,” said Maros Sefcovic, commission’s vice president for energy union. “We want to build on that and use this leadership role strategically to create jobs and growth and deliver on our common policy priorities.”

To contact the reporter on this story: Ewa Krukowska in Brussels at ekrukowska@bloomberg.net To contact the editors responsible for this story: Reed Landberg at landberg@bloomberg.net Jones Hayden

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