Technopolis Group contributed to a major study supporting the evaluation of the European Union’s executive agencies, led by EY in collaboration with the Centre for European Policy Studies (CEPS) and Henningsen Consulting. The evaluation brought together expertise from Technopolis Group offices in Belgium, the Netherlands and the UK, combining cross-office collaboration with thematic knowledge from areas including green transition, digital economy and technologies, and research and innovation.
This study assessed the effectiveness, efficiency, and coherence of six EU executive agencies responsible for implementing a wide range of EU programmes between April 2021 and March 2024: EACEA, ERCEA, REA, CINEA, EISMEA, and HaDEA. It examined how the agencies delivered their operational objectives, managed resources, interacted with parent Directorates-General, and contributed to institutional policy goals.
Technopolis Group contributed expertise across different evaluation dimensions, including cross-agency analysis, stakeholder consultation, operational assessment, and policy coherence.
Key findings and lessons
The findings show that the executive agencies demonstrated strong operational and financial performance, with high levels of stakeholder satisfaction and significant efficiency gains. The retrospective cost-benefit analysis estimated aggregated savings of €702 million, exceeding the initial projections made in the 2021 cost-benefit analysis.
The study also highlighted opportunities for further improvement across areas such as workload management, communication with applicants, digital transformation, environmental reporting, staff mobility, and Feedback to Policy (F2P) mechanisms. The findings provide valuable lessons to support the continuous improvement of the EU executive agency model.
Reports now available
The reports are now available on the Technopolis Group website:
- Study supporting the evaluation of the EU Executive Agencies: Cross analysis
- European Climate, Infrastructure and Environment Executive Agency (CINEA)
- European Health and Digital Executive Agency (HaDEA)
- European Research Executive Agency (REA)
- European Research Council Executive Agency (ERCEA)
- European Innovation Council and SMEs Executive Agency (EISMEA)