Europe’s Digital Single Market

The European Commission has made several new factsheets available. They summarise the current state of play and the potential social and economic opportunities of the European Digital Market.

• Potential economic contribution to the EU per year €415 billion
• 1.3 million new jobs could be created by 2025
• 500,000 unfilled ICT vacancies by 2020
• €10.1 billion invested in EU tech companies in the first three quarters of 2016
• Six billion devices will be connected in Europe by 2020
• 169 million Europeans do not have basic digital skills

Recent EU initiatives and decisions include:

• Mobile roaming charges abolished across the EU
• New rules to clarify and simplify VAT collection on e-services sold online
• A new single set of rules on the protection of personal data comes into effect in May 2018
• From early 2018, EU citizens will be able to enjoy their online films, sports broadcasts, music, video games, and e-book subscriptions when travelling across borders in the EU
• From May 2018, the EU will be equipped with its first ever common cybersecurity law (the Network Information Security Directive) to help keep network and information systems safe in all Member States
• The Upskilling Pathways Initiative enables adults who did not learn to literacy, numeracy or digital skills in school to do so later in life
• The Digital Skills and Jobs Coalition has trained more than 7 million Europeans in less than a year
• EU Code Week promotes coding – almost one million people participated in 2016
• Financial support to help connect 6.5 million Spanish students
• Launch of a digital marketplace for IT training in Bulgaria

The factsheets can be found here.