CEN-CENELEC GUIDE 39. The role of standards in support of Technology Transfer. Edition 1, March 2022

The main target audience of this Guide are the researchers and providers of new technologies who want to see their research outcome or new technology taken up by the market as well as innovators, entrepreneurs and start- ups who want their innovation to enter the market, and are interested to know whether and how standardization can help them to meet their objective. The use of standardization in support of the uptake of an innovation by the market consists of: 

• the application of existing standards on which the innovative product/service relies; 

• contributions to and participation in the standardization process, to ensure the standards accommodate the innovative product/service. 

Whilst both aspects will be touched upon in this Guide, most attention will go to the ways researchers/innovators/entrepreneurs can interact with standardization, and what it brings for them. Another target audience of this Guide are policymakers in Science, Technology and Innovation, operators of funding programs and venture capitalists investing in technological innovation. Consequently, the Guide contains information on how researchers and innovators can make initial contacts with the standardization community, as well as information on the ways that CEN and CENELEC can offer them to take advantage of standardization.