20 June 2017
Mr Donald Tusk
President of the European Council
Dear President,
The Digital Single Market mid-term review, after two years of constant progress following the
publication of the Strategy, is a perfect opportunity for the European Council to reaffirm our
political priority to the digital agenda, indicate directions of its further development, and commit
ourselves to regularly discuss its progress.
The European Single Market with its four freedoms has brought enormous benefits for the European
Union and its citizens. Our joint effort and the way it has shaped the Union presents a success story,
which the undersigned and the EU Member States they represent are proud of.
By the constant urge towards development and expansion, the Single Market has brought down
numerous barriers to allow even greater cooperation, unlocking new potential and providing new
opportunities.
Taking into account the continuous digital transformation, we have already managed to take some
timely decisions to strengthen the Single Market to the new digital era. We have also continued our
efforts to break down barriers in the European Union, be it with the abolition of roaming surcharges
as the most recent example or cross-border portability of online content.
However the main challenges to fully embrace the opportunities of digitization are still ahead of us.
Therefore, next steps are necessary. It is our firm belief that to continue enhancing European unity
and prosperity, and in order to have a sustainable Europe, we need to strongly embed the idea of
a strong, connected and developing Single Market of which the digital dimension is the main engine.
We are convinced that this principle, adopted in the Rome Declaration, should be of priority
interest, and that it needs our strong and continued political support at the highest level.
Even though the digital agenda consists of many separate initiatives, which may seem too technical
to e a su je t of the Europea Cou il’s o er ,
the cumulative effect of the Digital Single Market
is of key importance for the future of the European society and economy.
That leaves us with the need for a new digital driven mind-set that uses digital economy and
information society to become a more coherent, innovative, open, fair and sustainable European
Union, a
d to e sure Europe’s
global competitiveness. To achieve that, we need to focus on the
following measures:
We need to be there for business.
To achieve this we must think horizontally and deliver in the
most comprehensive way. We need to support industry and our companies. We share the
ambitions for digitising European Industry. But we also need to do more for SMEs, which are the
backbone of the European economy, so that they take part in the digital transformation, to
become a central element of European digital eco-system, and to make the European market
a first choice for our start-ups and scale ups. For that we need a future oriented and positive
approach to emerging technologies such as Blockchain, big data, artificial intelligence, supporting
both their development, as well as their implementation by our companies. We should also keep
in mind the need for proper investment in digital technologies and infrastructure, including
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