The overall objective of this study was to gather evidence on the effectiveness of public support for innovation in Europe. A key finding of the study is that SMEs in the EU continue to face barriers to innovation; for micro-enterprises, these are primarily financial barriers; for small and medium-sized enterprises, access to skilled labor is the most significant barrier. On the other hand, with regard to the effectiveness of support services, different contextual conditions in the individual member states make it difficult to draw a blanket conclusion, but most SMEs see public support as crucial for carrying out their innovation activities.

The study can be found here.