Good afternoon.

Welcome to our college readout with EVP Virkunen and the press conference on the twenty-eighth regime also with Commissioner Zaharieva and Commissioner McGrath. You may have listened.

We've seen the statement that President von der Leyen has just given to you on this very subject of the 28th regime,

and now we are here with the three commissioners who have very, very closely worked on this file. EVP Virkkunen, the floor is yours.

Good afternoon and welcome to the readout of our meeting of college today.

We had an orientation debate on merger guidelines and also we discussed on our EUIC initiative the core proposal within our broader work to create a 28 regime in the European Union.

These proposals also include a recommendation on the definitions of innovative enterprises,

start ups and high growth scale ups.

President von der Leyen already presented them to you a few moments ago.

Let me begin by thanking my colleagues, Commissioners Michael McGrath and Ekaterina Zaharieva,

for their excellent collaboration, as well as the President of the Commission.

Today, we are really taking an important step to strengthen Europe's competitiveness and also advance the single market,

so we have heard the message of our businesses and we can also see it in the statistics that growing and scaling businesses is not as easy in Europe as it should be,

and we want to change this course.

Our goal is very simple we want to make it easier for businesses,

especially start ups and scale ups, to grow across our borders, compete globally and also innovate from Europe. This ambition is not new.

We have made this loud and clear in our competitiveness compass,

in the start up and scale up strategy and also in our single market strategy, and today we deliver.

At the heart of the 28 regime is EU Inc. EU Inc will be a game changer.

It provides a flexible digital by default modern company law framework that founders can choose,

covering the entire life cycle of their companies from setting up a company and scaling up to winding down.

It also offers businesses the freedom to choose their seat within the EU, aligned with the freedom of establishment and the European Court of Justice case law,

and this means that EU inc companies will still comply with European standards,

whether in tax, labor or consumer protection. This is about smart regulation, not deregulation.

Michael will soon shed more light on the details of the EU inc.

But the 28 regime is a broader concept. It will go beyond this EU Inc.

Companies they face barriers beyond company law, taxation, employment, insolvency,

and digitalization, all of which can hinder growth.

That is why our Schape communication outlines how existing and upcoming initiatives also will align to support scaling up.

In taxation, the Head Office tax system simplifies rules for SMEs,

and later this year we will have a tax omnibus and it will look into further streamlining procedures.

We also call on Member States to harmonize tax treatment of employer stock options,

which we are establishing with EU Inc, and this will be critical to attract talent.

On employment and access to talent, the Fair Labour Mobility Package later this year will digitalize procedures and explore 100 telework cross border,

helping our startups hire, for instance, digital nomads under familiar rules. Digitalisation will be also key.

The business wallet will cut red tape, reduce translation costs and strengthen fraud prevention,

making cross border operations smoother and safer. Finally, more legal predictability.

We encourage our Member States to establish specialized courts to handle disputes efficiently,

reinforcing trust in the EU inc label. But this is just the beginning.

The 28 regime launches today, but our work doesn't stop here.

We need to adopt the EUIC proposal by the end of this year,

an ambitious but necessary timeline to ensure that Europe remains at the forefront of global innovation,

and we must keep pushing for further measures.

So our goal is very clear we want European businesses to grow, to stay and to thrive in the EU.

We want to bring back those who left.

In simple terms, we want to make it easier for people with good ideas,

so thank you very much, and now I will pass the floor to E Katarina.