This research evaluates the effectiveness of the European Union’s (EU) 2030 Digital Decade Policy Programme (DDPP), highlighting its current shortcomings and providing recommendations for improvement. The DDPP aims to enhance the EU’s global competitiveness and align digital transformation with European values, focusing on digital skills, infrastructure, business digitalisation, and public services. However, the 2023 and 2024 reports indicate that the EU is off track to meet its 2030 goals, with slow progress on all targets. Potential challenges stemming from a failure of the DDPP include a loss of technological competitiveness, a widening digital divide, skills polarisation, and the creation of new vulnerable groups. Reckoning with the critical state of the DDPP, President von der Leyen has tasked Henna Virkkunen, Executive Vice-President (EVP) for Tech, Sovereignty, Security and Democracy, with a review of the strategy to be carried out in 2026. Ahead of it, this research aims to kickstart a conversation on the need to substantially and comprehensively revisit the DDPP targets. It combines desk research with expert discussions to assess the effectiveness of the Digital Compass and reveals significant delays, funding issues, and an overall lack of coherence in the strategy.
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