EIT RawMaterials Summit 2026 Programme
At the EIT RawMaterials Summit 2026, leaders across the full raw and advanced materials value chain – from lab to plant, policy to procurement – will turn EU priorities into action: scaling domestic extraction, processing, and recycling; anchoring value in Europe; securing trusted global partnerships; and closing critical skills gaps. In a tougher geopolitical landscape, this is the flagship public–private forum where challenge becomes value creation.
May 19th
May 20th
May 21st
9:00am - 9:30am
Auditorium
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2026-05-20 09:00:00
EIT RawMaterials Summit 2026: EIT RawMaterials Summit Opening Session
Speakers and further information to be announced
Rue Bara 175, 1070 Bruxelles, Belgium, The Egg, Auditorium
RAW MATERIALS
http://eitrmsummit.com/eit-rawmaterials-summit-2026/eit-rawmaterials-summit-opening-session
Europe/Brussels
public
EIT RawMaterials Summit Opening Session
Moderated by
David Eades, Peter Handley
9:30am - 10:15am
Auditorium
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2026-05-20 09:30:00
EIT RawMaterials Summit 2026: From Architecture to Action: Delivering Europe’s Critical Raw Materials Strategy
The EU has designed the architecture — now comes the execution. This session brings together the three European Commission Directorates at the heart of Europe’s raw materials agenda — DG GROW (Internal Market & Industry), DG TRADE, and DG INTPA (International Partnerships) — for a frank, joined-up conversation on how the CRMA benchmarks and strategic projects, Europe’s new EUR3bn commitment to the sector under the RESourceEU programme, and global strategic partnerships, are translating raw materials security from strategy to delivery. Balanced by a board-level industry perspective, it’s the session where Europe’s critical raw materials strategy meets the hard questions of capital, delivery, and competitive geopolitical realities.
Rue Bara 175, 1070 Bruxelles, Belgium, The Egg, Auditorium
RAW MATERIALS
http://eitrmsummit.com/eit-rawmaterials-summit-2026/architecture-action-delivering-europes-critical-raw-materials-strategy
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public
From Architecture to Action: Delivering Europe’s Critical Raw Materials Strategy
Moderated by
David Eades
10:45am - 11:00am
Auditorium
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2026-05-20 10:45:00
EIT RawMaterials Summit 2026: Keynote: How Global Gateway is Delivering on Raw Materials Diversification
In a keynote, Koen Doens, Director-General for International Partnerships, moves beyond the case for diversification and outlines the concrete actions being taken through Global Gateway to secure Europe's raw materials supply chains. He highlights how the initiative connects European companies to strategic markets, de-risks investment, and strengthens Europe's strategic competitiveness, while advancing the development priorities of partner countries.
Rue Bara 175, 1070 Bruxelles, Belgium, The Egg, Auditorium
RAW MATERIALS
http://eitrmsummit.com/eit-rawmaterials-summit-2026/keynote-how-global-gateway-delivering-raw-materials-diversification
Europe/Brussels
public
Keynote: How Global Gateway is Delivering on Raw Materials Diversification
Moderated by
Peter Handley
11:00am - 11:45am
Auditorium
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2026-05-20 11:00:00
EIT RawMaterials Summit 2026: EU Strategy to Diversify Raw Materials Supply: Lessons from the Ground
The stakes are clear: Europe imports nearly 100% of its rare earth elements, over 70% of its lithium, with China dominating global processing capacity across most critical materials categories. By 2030, the CRMA mandates that no single non-EU country supplies more than 65% of any strategic raw materials consumed in the EU, demanding urgent action. This session asks what that action actually looks like on the ground. What are the concrete steps, strategic partnerships, and hard lessons from implementation so far? The discussion examines how resource partnerships must be anchored in Europe’s industrial needs — aligning upstream extraction and processing with downstream manufacturing demand, and what it takes for research collaboration in critical areas like rare earth separation to translate into active projects. From Albania to Uzbekistan, European and partner-country voices share their successes and challenges, and how the CRM Facility can drive results by identifying the right partners, catalysing innovation, and accelerating project development.
Rue Bara 175, 1070 Bruxelles, Belgium, The Egg, Auditorium
RAW MATERIALS
http://eitrmsummit.com/eit-rawmaterials-summit-2026/eu-strategy-diversify-raw-materials-supply-lessons-ground
Europe/Brussels
public
EU Strategy to Diversify Raw Materials Supply: Lessons from the Ground
Moderated by
Peter Handley
11:45am - 12:30pm
Auditorium
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2026-05-20 11:45:00
EIT RawMaterials Summit 2026: Three Initiatives, One Goal: How Combined Efforts Will Support RESourceEU for Supply Security
Europe’s ambition to secure and diversify its Critical Raw Materials supply cannot rely on a single instrument or geography. This panel takes a macro-view of how three distinct initiatives—the EU-Australia CRM Partnership, the Greenland Green Growth Project, and the CRM-Facility, work in tandem to advance RESourceEU and build a resilient, multi-speed supply chain for Europe. The panel will bring together perspectives from the three initiatives to demonstrate how this framework is being operationalised across regions and stages of development — from upstream geological exploration, processing and refining to concrete offtake agreements. The panel is complemented by an industry perspective, giving voice to what companies expect EU-backed initiatives to deliver, how mid-stream actors assess emerging partnerships, and what Europe must offer to convert strategic intent into commercially viable, long-term supply relationships.
Rue Bara 175, 1070 Bruxelles, Belgium, The Egg, Auditorium
RAW MATERIALS
http://eitrmsummit.com/eit-rawmaterials-summit-2026/three-initiatives-one-goal-how-combined-efforts-will-support
Europe/Brussels
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Three Initiatives, One Goal: How Combined Efforts Will Support RESourceEU for Supply Security
Moderated by
Peter Handley
2:00pm - 2:45pm
Auditorium
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2026-05-20 14:00:00
EIT RawMaterials Summit 2026: The Talent Gap: What Industry Needs to Build Europe’s Materials Workforce
Europe cannot build the raw materials value chains it needs without the people to run them — and right now, the talent pipeline is not keeping pace. This session is framed by the first integrated, pan-European skills analysis spanning the full materials value chain, identifying the most urgent gaps across mining, processing, recycling, semiconductors, batteries, and advanced materials manufacturing — and crucially, where these sectors are competing for the same scarce talent. Responding to this analysis, a panel of leaders from industry, vocational education, and academia will examine what it will take to close the gaps, how education and training systems need to adapt, and how the European Raw and Advanced Materials Academies, led by EIT RawMaterials, can accelerate talent development at the scale Europe’s ambitions demand.
Rue Bara 175, 1070 Bruxelles, Belgium, The Egg, Auditorium
RAW MATERIALS
http://eitrmsummit.com/eit-rawmaterials-summit-2026/talent-gap-what-industry-needs-build-europes-materials-workforce
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The Talent Gap: What Industry Needs to Build Europe’s Materials Workforce
Moderated by
David Eades
2:45pm - 3:15pm
Auditorium
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2026-05-20 14:45:00
EIT RawMaterials Summit 2026: To Be Announced
TBC
Rue Bara 175, 1070 Bruxelles, Belgium, The Egg, Auditorium
RAW MATERIALS
http://eitrmsummit.com/eit-rawmaterials-summit-2026/be-announced
Europe/Brussels
public
To Be Announced
3:45pm - 4:30pm
Auditorium
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2026-05-20 15:45:00
EIT RawMaterials Summit 2026: Mine-to-Battlefield: Critical Materials and the Future of European Defence Capability
Europe is committing historic levels of capital to defence — but the ability to build, sustain and scale military capability depends on something that rarely features in defence budget debates: the materials inside the systems. From the aluminium in fighter aircraft and the graphite in main battle tanks, to the rare earth elements in missile guidance systems and the gallium in advanced radar and electronic warfare, modern defence hardware is only as strong as the supply chains behind it. NATO’s December 2024 list of 12 defence-critical raw materials made the dependency explicit — and the exposure stark, with China controlling 60–90% of global processing capacity for many of them. Yet Europe remains heavily import-dependent not only at the mine, but across the entire value chain: processing, smelting, advanced materials manufacture, and critical component production such as permanent magnets. This session asks the question that defence and industry leaders can no longer defer — as Europe rearms and accelerates defence-tech development under ReArm Europe, EDIP and rising NATO commitments, how can it build the material resilience to back it up?
Rue Bara 175, 1070 Bruxelles, Belgium, The Egg, Auditorium
RAW MATERIALS
http://eitrmsummit.com/eit-rawmaterials-summit-2026/mine-battlefield-critical-materials-and-future-european-defence
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Mine-to-Battlefield: Critical Materials and the Future of European Defence Capability
Moderated by
David Eades
4:30pm - 5:15pm
Auditorium
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2026-05-20 16:30:00
EIT RawMaterials Summit 2026: Disruptive Innovation in Raw Materials, Advanced Materials, and the Circular Economy
Europe's materials future is already being built. This showcase features five startups from the EIT RawMaterials community, Europe's largest raw materials innovation ecosystem, demonstrating solutions that span the full value chain: from magnet recycling and refrigerant-free cooling to critical mineral recovery, CO₂-derived graphite, and materials traceability. Two of the startups, MagREESource and UP Catalyst, have been recognised as Strategic Projects under the Critical Raw Materials Act. The startups will share firsthand insights into what it takes to go from breakthroughs to bankable projects, offering fresh perspectives on how innovation can drive Europe’s industrial competitiveness.
Rue Bara 175, 1070 Bruxelles, Belgium, The Egg, Auditorium
RAW MATERIALS
http://eitrmsummit.com/eit-rawmaterials-summit-2026/disruptive-innovation-raw-materials-advanced-materials-and-circular
Europe/Brussels
public
Disruptive Innovation in Raw Materials, Advanced Materials, and the Circular Economy
5:15pm - 5:30pm
Auditorium
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2026-05-20 17:15:00
EIT RawMaterials Summit 2026: Closing Fireside Chat
Closing Fireside Chat
Rue Bara 175, 1070 Bruxelles, Belgium, The Egg, Auditorium
RAW MATERIALS
http://eitrmsummit.com/eit-rawmaterials-summit-2026/closing-fireside-chat
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Closing Fireside Chat
9:00am - 9:30am
Auditorium
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2026-05-21 09:00:00
EIT RawMaterials Summit 2026: Opening Fireside Chat
Europe's strategy to overcome the linear raw materials business paradigm
Rue Bara 175, 1070 Bruxelles, Belgium, The Egg, Auditorium
RAW MATERIALS
http://eitrmsummit.com/eit-rawmaterials-summit-2026/opening-fireside-chat
Europe/Brussels
public
Opening Fireside Chat
Moderated by
David Eades
9:30am - 10:15am
Auditorium
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2026-05-21 09:30:00
EIT RawMaterials Summit 2026: Europe’s Other Mine: Circularity as Europe’s Competitive Advantage
Europe’s circular economy conversation has too often been framed as an environmental imperative. The strategic reality is sharper than that. With cobalt recycling rates at 22%, nickel at 16%, neodymium at just 1% and lithium effectively at zero, Europe is sitting on a significant and largely untapped secondary supply base — one that could meaningfully reduce import dependency, buffer against geopolitical shocks, and anchor value-added processing capacity on European soil. In a global trade environment where access to primary supply is increasingly contested, circularity is not a sustainability add-on — it is a competitive lever, and one where European industry, innovation and regulation are genuinely well-positioned to lead. But unlocking that potential requires more than recycling infrastructure. It demands design-for-recovery commitments from downstream manufacturers, clear market signals, bankable business models, and a regulatory environment that treats secondary materials as a strategic resource rather than a waste management challenge. This session brings together voices from across the value chain — mining, processing, recycling, and industry — to make the case for circularity as strategic depth, and to tackle the enablement question head-on: what will it take for Europe’s circular materials economy to move from ambition to industrial scale?
Rue Bara 175, 1070 Bruxelles, Belgium, The Egg, Auditorium
RAW MATERIALS
http://eitrmsummit.com/eit-rawmaterials-summit-2026/europes-other-mine-circularity-europes-competitive-advantage
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Europe’s Other Mine: Circularity as Europe’s Competitive Advantage
Moderated by
Mark Rachovides
10:45am - 11:30am
Auditorium
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2026-05-21 10:45:00
EIT RawMaterials Summit 2026: From Design to Recovery: Closing the Loop in Advanced Materials
Permanent magnets, specialty alloys, semiconductors, and functional coatings power Europe’s defense, mobility, electronics, and energy systems. But their very complexity also makes them hard to recycle and reintegrate into production cycles. Without a circular approach, Europe risks greater import dependence and significant value loss. With the Circular Economy Act and the Advanced Materials Act both taking shape in 2026, this session convenes national resource strategists, industry leaders, disruptive innovators, ecosystem builders to examine what it takes to embed circularity into the advanced materials value chains. The discussion will move beyond recycling alone to tackle circularity-by-design, breakthrough recovery technologies, and how to build competitive markets for secondary advanced materials at scale.
Rue Bara 175, 1070 Bruxelles, Belgium, The Egg, Auditorium
RAW MATERIALS
http://eitrmsummit.com/eit-rawmaterials-summit-2026/design-recovery-closing-loop-advanced-materials
Europe/Brussels
public
From Design to Recovery: Closing the Loop in Advanced Materials
Moderated by
Peter Handley
11:30am - 12:15pm
Auditorium
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2026-05-21 11:30:00
EIT RawMaterials Summit 2026: The Future Workforce: What Europe’s Next Generation Expects from the Materials Industry
Europe’s raw materials sector faces a talent crisis, but the people who are the answer are not yet in the room, until now. For the first time at the EIT RawMaterials Summit, the stage spotlights the next generation. Young representatives from EIT RawMaterials-run education programmes, including the EIT Higher Education Initiative (HEI), Girls Go STEM, and the EIT-labeled master’s programmes, take the floor to deliver rapid-fire insights on what draws emerging talents to careers in the materials sector — and what drives them away. The insights they surface on skills gap, career paths and purpose and workplace culture are direct signals to future employers, educators and policymakers on what the sector must adapt to strengthen Europe’s talent pipelines.
Rue Bara 175, 1070 Bruxelles, Belgium, The Egg, Auditorium
RAW MATERIALS
http://eitrmsummit.com/eit-rawmaterials-summit-2026/future-workforce-what-europes-next-generation-expects-materials
Europe/Brussels
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The Future Workforce: What Europe’s Next Generation Expects from the Materials Industry
Moderated by
Dolores Volkert
2:00pm - 2:45pm
Auditorium
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2026-05-21 14:00:00
EIT RawMaterials Summit 2026: Built not planned: What Europe Can Learn from Japan, Australia and Canada on Financing Critical Materials Projects
Europe has no shortage of potential CRM projects. What it has consistently lacked is the financial architecture to get them built. While European projects stall in the valley of death between exploration and production, Japan, Australia and Canada have spent years constructing the policy and financing machinery to bridge exactly that gap. Japan’s JOGMEC operates with patient, whole-of-value-chain state backing via equity, debt guarantees and offtake support; Australia stacks concessional loans, production tax incentives and a newly established national offtake authority; and Canada purposely built a C$2 billion Critical Minerals Sovereign Fund to provide the equity, guarantees and purchase commitments that commercial finance alone won't extend. The common thread across all three is unambiguous: strategic intent translated into purpose-designed instruments, with public risk absorption calibrated to unlock private capital at scale. This session brings together senior voices from Japan's METI and JOGMEC, the Australian government, and Canada's financing institutions to share hard-won lessons on instrument design, deal structuring, and public-private risk sharing — and to ask what it will take for Europe's own emerging architecture to match the scale of the challenge it faces.
Rue Bara 175, 1070 Bruxelles, Belgium, The Egg, Auditorium
RAW MATERIALS
http://eitrmsummit.com/eit-rawmaterials-summit-2026/built-not-planned-what-europe-can-learn-japan-australia-and-canada
Europe/Brussels
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Built not planned: What Europe Can Learn from Japan, Australia and Canada on Financing Critical Materials Projects
Moderated by
David Eades
2:45pm - 3:30pm
Auditorium
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2026-05-21 14:45:00
EIT RawMaterials Summit 2026: To Be Announced
TBA
Rue Bara 175, 1070 Bruxelles, Belgium, The Egg, Auditorium
RAW MATERIALS
http://eitrmsummit.com/eit-rawmaterials-summit-2026/be-announced-0
Europe/Brussels
public
To Be Announced
4:00pm - 4:30pm
Auditorium
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2026-05-21 16:00:00
EIT RawMaterials Summit 2026: Fertile Ground, Scale-up Challenge: Turning European Research Excellence to Industrial Leadership
Europe's investment in raw and advanced materials research has delivered real returns. Patent applications match the US and China, the innovation pipeline is deep, and programmes from Horizon Europe to the EIC have produced genuine breakthroughs across extraction, processing, recycling and advanced materials. But research excellence alone does not win the competitiveness race. As President von der Leyen has noted, Europe is roughly as good as the US at creating start-ups — and significantly worse at scaling them. The challenge is no longer generating the ideas; it is building the full value chain infrastructure — the pilot facilities, the offtake agreements, the patient capital, and the industrial partnerships — that turn promising technology into sovereign production capacity. In a fragmenting global trade landscape, where the US and China are investing at a speed and scale that dwarfs European instruments, the question is not whether Europe's innovation soil is fertile, but whether the conditions exist to grow a complete industrial ecosystem from it. This session brings together research institutions, deep-tech innovators, open innovation hubs, and industry to define what it will take to move from Europe's proven innovation strengths to the full-chain value creation that genuine strategic autonomy demands.
Rue Bara 175, 1070 Bruxelles, Belgium, The Egg, Auditorium
RAW MATERIALS
http://eitrmsummit.com/eit-rawmaterials-summit-2026/fertile-ground-scale-challenge-turning-european-research-excellence
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Fertile Ground, Scale-up Challenge: Turning European Research Excellence to Industrial Leadership
Moderated by
Peter Handley
4:30pm - 5:15pm
Auditorium
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2026-05-21 16:30:00
EIT RawMaterials Summit 2026: The Hidden Backbone of CRM Finance: Europe's Export Credit Agencies in Action
When a critical raw materials project reaches financial close, the headline often goes to the equity investors and the bank. But behind almost every bankable deal is a European export credit agency providing the debt guarantees, political risk cover, and long-tenor financing structures that make it possible for commercial banks to lend at all. With [over €100 billion] in combined portfolio exposure across European ECAs, and agencies [like EKN, EIFO, and Euler Hermes] increasingly extending their mandates to cover not just exports but strategic resource security, the network is quietly becoming one of the most powerful tools Europe has for securing its critical materials supply chain globally. This session brings together leading European ECAs and a major commercial bank to showcase how ECA finance is structured around CRM projects, what the network has delivered, and how deeper coordination could amplify Europe's ability to anchor trusted supply partnerships across the globe.
Rue Bara 175, 1070 Bruxelles, Belgium, The Egg, Auditorium
RAW MATERIALS
http://eitrmsummit.com/eit-rawmaterials-summit-2026/hidden-backbone-crm-finance-europes-export-credit-agencies-action
Europe/Brussels
public
The Hidden Backbone of CRM Finance: Europe's Export Credit Agencies in Action
Moderated by
Peter Handley
5:15pm - 5:30pm
Auditorium
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2026-05-21 17:15:00
EIT RawMaterials Summit 2026: Closing
Closing day 2
Rue Bara 175, 1070 Bruxelles, Belgium, The Egg, Auditorium
RAW MATERIALS
http://eitrmsummit.com/eit-rawmaterials-summit-2026/closing
Europe/Brussels
public
Closing
Moderated by
David Eades