NATO to set up innovation fund to boost research benefiting the military

MADRID, June 30 (Reuters) - NATO will launch a one billion euro ($1.04 billion) innovation fund to foster technological research that would be of use to the military, Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said on Thursday.

Leaders gathered at the NATO summit in Madrid agreed to set up the fund, Stoltenberg told reporters on the third and last day of the meeting.

"We agreed ... to establish a new one billion innovation fund," Stoltenberg told a news conference.

The multinational fund is meant to bring together governments, the private sector and academia to bolster NATO's technological edge, according to the alliance.

The United States has for decades relied on the much bigger DARPA, the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency, to make investments in breakthrough technologies that may benefit national security. ($1 = 0.9605 euros) (Reporting by Sabine Siebold, editing by Robin Emmott)