Capacity Building Archives - META Group https://www.meta-group.com/impact-cat/capacity-building/ Knowledge to Market Thu, 28 Sep 2023 09:14:29 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.4.3 https://www.meta-group.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/favicon_30th-e1704732147652-100x100.png Capacity Building Archives - META Group https://www.meta-group.com/impact-cat/capacity-building/ 32 32 Enriching European History with Big Data https://www.meta-group.com/impact-story/enriching-european-history-with-big-data/ Mon, 08 May 2023 08:55:29 +0000 https://www.meta-group.com/?post_type=osf_portfolio&p=7895 Time Machine aims to link Europe’s rich past with up-to-date digital technologies and infrastructures. This will create a collective digital information system that maps Europe’s economic, social, cultural, and geographical evolution over time. Within the framework of the European Union’s corona virus recovery plan, the European Commission initiated a new support action for interregional partnerships. …

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Time Machine aims to link Europe’s rich past with up-to-date digital technologies and infrastructures. This will create a collective digital information system that maps Europe’s economic, social, cultural, and geographical evolution over time.

Within the framework of the European Union’s corona virus recovery plan, the European Commission initiated a new support action for interregional partnerships. It aims to mobilise regional and national innovation actors to address the impact of the Covid-19.

To accelerate recovery from Covid-19 challenges, it drew upon the successful experience of similar actions, such as the strategy employed in Trento, Italy. This strategy focused on interregional innovation projects and aimed to create tangible investment projects in specific thematic areas.

Time Machine aims to build on the Big Data of the past, creating a vast distributed digital information system that maps Europe’s social, cultural and geographical evolution over time. This large-scale digitalisation and IT infrastructure will enable Europe to turn its long history, as well as its multilingualism and interculturalism, into a living social and economic resource.

By expanding the frontiers of scientific research in Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) and Social Sciences and Humanities (SSH), Time Machine will have a strong impact on key sectors of the European economy: ICT software, creative industries, and tourism. In addition, it will offer new perspectives in urban planning, land management and smart city development.

The initiative is expected to have strong long-term positive effects on European cohesion, economy and society. It will contribute to the promotion of critical thinking at all levels of decision-making. The structure is also expected to strengthen the sense of European identity. In addition, it will boost competences such as entrepreneurship, employment, and scientific and technological competitiveness across the European Union.

META Group’s Support

META Group supported the Time Machine initiative in the implementation and technical development of business innovation investment cases selected by the Virtual and Smart Digital Tourism partnership. The main role of META Group is to guide and support the partnership in the preparation of a business and investment plan, interacting with case partners to provide strategic advice and guidance in presenting it to potential investors.

Watch the below video and take a tour of the Time Machine website to learn more.  

 
 

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]]> Supporting SMEs Through Policy With Scale-Up https://www.meta-group.com/impact-story/lazioinnova-supporting-smes-through-policy-with-scale-up/ Mon, 08 May 2023 08:41:36 +0000 https://www.meta-group.com/?post_type=osf_portfolio&p=7880 It’s a known fact that when regions manage to attract entrepreneurial talent and young start-ups to their area, the entire area benefits as a result. ​Innovation can be the lifeblood of a region.  Innovative companies bring young, highly skilled workers, who have a dynamic lifestyle, who have young families, who avail of the already-existing businesses …

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When regions attract entrepreneurial talent and young start-ups, the entire area benefits. It’s a known fact.

​Innovation can be the lifeblood of a region. 

Innovative companies bring young, highly skilled workers with dynamic lifestyles and young families. They avail of the already-existing businesses and services in the area. This injection of workers to a community can boost local businesses and increase employment opportunities.

However, innovative companies also have very specific needs, and the regions in which they settle need to be able to address these concerns. The Lazio Region in Italy knows this and has already put in place a number of initiatives to make the area more friendly to start-ups.

Now, those start-ups are growing up, and it’s time to support them to scale-up at the national and international level.

The “SCALE-UP Supporting concentration and robustness of SMEs within the renewed EU industrial policy” project involves several regions across the EU. It’s funded by Interreg Europe and LazioInnova is a partner in this project. The goal is to improve the policy instruments – such as Regional Action Plans – that support SMEs’ capacity to grow, both at national and international level.

LazioInnova have selected META Group to define a new Regional Action Plan that will outline the path that the Lazio Region needs to take in order to attract and retain innovative companies, as part of the SCALE-UP project.

META Group analysed all the good practices that LazioInnova and the other partners have shared regarding their regional policies. META Group also provided LazioInnova with a SWOT analysis and a validation of these best practices. Next steps will be the preparation of the Regional Action Plan to pave the way to the adoption of the selected practices to boost scale-up.

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]]> Strenghtening the commercialisation of Active Assisted Living programme results https://www.meta-group.com/impact-story/aal2business-strenghtening-commercialisation-assisted-living-programme/ Mon, 08 May 2023 07:47:47 +0000 https://www.meta-group.com/?post_type=osf_portfolio&p=7854 How does a company transform a great idea into a commercial opportunity? AAL2Business created market-ready products and services to achieve better quality of life for older people The Active Assisted Living (AAL) Programme was a funding programme that aimed to strengthen industrial opportunities in the field of healthy ageing technology and innovation. Projects that work towards …

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How does a company transform a great idea into a commercial opportunity? AAL2Business created market-ready products and services to achieve better quality of life for older people

The Active Assisted Living (AAL) Programme was a funding programme that aimed to strengthen industrial opportunities in the field of healthy ageing technology and innovation.

Projects that work towards creating market-ready products and services to create better quality of life for older people get funded. To give these projects the last push that they need to get into the market, AALcreated AAL2Business. This initiative was delivered by META Group and APRE. It provided business support to the beneficiaries of the AAL Programme to strengthen their commercialisation strategy and drive project results into the market.

Dario Mazzella, a trainer and innovation expert from META Group says: “Our aim is to push (the entrepreneurs) to get out of the building, select one segment and contact potential customers to validate their assumptions.”

AAL2Business SERVICES

  1. Lean Start Up Academy: A chance to increase commercial traction and further market success.
    AAL projects will be guided by business coaches in how to identify their target market. Also, they will help them to use the best channels to reach their potential customers, choose a fitting value proposition.  Validating their business model by checking their assumptions against the market plays also a crucial role.

  2. Go-to-Market Launchpad
    Provides the project teams with dedicated training and coaching on how to present a business value proposition in a clear and convincing way and how to catch the attention of investors and/or potential customers and business partners.

  3. Thematic Online Courses: Live webinars.Participants will be given an insight into how to improve their skills and develop an entrepreneurial mindset.
    The webinar curricula will contain theoretical and practical modules related to the following topics:
    • the Lean Canvas
    • the Value Proposition Canvas
    • basics of IPR and the unfair advantage
    • advanced IPR (negotiation, IP transfer, etc.)
    • how to deal with potential customers
    • early stage investors (who they are and what are they looking for)
    • how to pitch to investors

Tools for business developtment: These selected tools and materials that help AAL projectsto succeed in business development include videos, reports and toolkits in business modelling, value proposition design, national funding, initiatives & more.

Market guidance

A business support network has been established comprised of AAL Business Experts Points (BEN) from each country, participating in the AAL programme to keep national AAL participants informed about commercialisation, market uptake and investment opportunities available at national and European level.

Visit aal-europe.eu/aal2business and learn more about META Group’s capacity building solutions. 

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]]> Self-assessment tool on the readiness of a R&D team to use its results https://www.meta-group.com/impact-story/boss-platform-self-assessment-tool-readiness-research-team-use-results/ Mon, 08 May 2023 07:42:46 +0000 https://www.meta-group.com/?post_type=osf_portfolio&p=7851 META Group has joined forces with the University of Liege and the University of Belgrade to develop a self-assessment business opportunity and planning tool. Many European citizens could benefit from having the entrepreneurial mindset needed to start their own businesses and the agility required to continuously adapt to the evolving requirements of the market. That’s …

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META Group has joined forces with the University of Liege and the University of Belgrade to develop a self-assessment business opportunity and planning tool.

Many European citizens could benefit from having the entrepreneurial mindset needed to start their own businesses and the agility required to continuously adapt to the evolving requirements of the market. That’s why META has joined forces with academic partners from the University of Liege and the University of Belgrade to develop a self-assessment business opportunity and planning tool, which will help would-be entrepreneurs evaluate their innovation’s potential, determine whether it will be a success, or what support they need.

The BOSS platform is specially designed for researchers, teachers, entrepreneurs, students, investors, as well as for institutions like universities, TTOs, VCs or Ministries.

This partnership strengthened the links between education, research and business by fostering an entrepreneurial mindset in teachers, researchers and students through innovative methods which enable successful creation and transfer of innovation from academia to private sector.

Objectives

  • To develop Open Educational Resources (OER) in a form of Business Opportunity Self-Assessment methodology
  • Development Planning Tool, appropriate educational material in different format, and open, automatised and web-based business
  • Opportunity support system (BOSS platform)
  • To stimulate teachers’, researchers’ and students’ ability to initiate and carry out entrepreneurial projects, ranging from opportunity recognition to opportunity exploitation
  • To strengthen existing business opportunity support systems at partner organisations by incorporating innovative OER into existing practices, which secures efficient transfer of ideas to market and encourages university-industry collaboration

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]]> Encouraging cities to create an innovation-friendly environment https://www.meta-group.com/impact-story/encouraging-cities-to-create-an-innovation-friendly-environment/ Mon, 08 May 2023 07:38:52 +0000 https://www.meta-group.com/?post_type=osf_portfolio&p=7848 Cities Challenge Italy is the first competition to reward the entrepreneurial capacity of a city and its ecosystem. Organized in collaboration with Gen Global Italy, StartupItalia!, Tree, Italia Startup, Iban, ItaliaCamp and Starboost it focuses specifically on encouraging midsized cities (50,000-250,000 inhabitants) to create an innovation-friendly environment to generate new business ideas, improve on existing ones, and attract people and capital. Cagliari, Reggio Emilia and Cava de’ Tirreni were the …

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Cities Challenge Italy is the first competition to reward the entrepreneurial capacity of a city and its ecosystem.

Organized in collaboration with Gen Global Italy, StartupItalia!, Tree, Italia Startup, Iban, ItaliaCamp and Starboost it focuses specifically on encouraging midsized cities (50,000-250,000 inhabitants) to create an innovation-friendly environment to generate new business ideas, improve on existing ones, and attract people and capital.

Cagliari, Reggio Emilia and Cava de’ Tirreni were the winners of the three editions held so far.

5 phases

1 – Application collection

Any citizen who is interested can submit an application on behalf of their city, after registering at Cities Challenge. META Group, who are coordinating the contest, will then send these proposals to the mayor of the relevant city, who must submit the formal official application.

2 – Selection of finalists

After the applications have been collected, they will be evaluated by a jury of experts, which will choose the finalist cities.

3 – Public vote

For a set period of time, Italian citizens can vote for whichever city, among the finalists, they consider to be the most entrepreneurial of Italy. To vote, they must click on “Vote now” on the homepage of the contest website fill the google form.

4 – Final pitching event

Representatives of the finalist cities will make a 5-minute pitch (presenting the city) in front of a jury, with the aim of demonstrating the importance and effectiveness of the entrepreneurial ecosystem of their city.

5 – Presentation to GEC

The winner will have the opportunity to attend the Global Entrepreneurship Congress event and present his/her city.

The winner is chosen by making a compendium between the popular vote (20%), the submitted documentation (50%) and the final pitch (30%).

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]]> Challenge competition for Cultural and Creative Industries https://www.meta-group.com/impact-story/challenge-based-competition-for-cultural-and-creative-industries-cci/ Mon, 08 May 2023 07:25:17 +0000 https://www.meta-group.com/?post_type=osf_portfolio&p=7837 The contest is organised by the University of Macerata and funded by the Italian Ministry of Education, University and Research. 11 challenges in the cultural and creative sector have been launched on the platform in this first round, looking for the best and innovative solutions.

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The contest was organised by the University of Macerata and funded by the Italian Ministry of Education, University and Research. 11 challenges in the cultural and creative sector had been launched on the platform looking for the best and innovative solutions.

Selected solutions have been rewarded with a mentoring programme divided into 10 modules to structure their business idea and help launching their product/service on the market. This training was provided by META Group experts. The winners will then got in contact with the companies that proposed the challenges, and they had the opportunity to start a collaboration with them.

As its names suggests, Culture and Creativity Club focused on solving the problems of Cultural and Creative Industries (CCI). CCIS have difficulties in accessing credit and lack resources to enhance their competitiveness on the global market, build effective partnerships, and extend their activity to other countries. CCIs also represent an innovative branch of business and have the potential to increase regional competitiveness and job creation capacity.

Examples of CCIs include architecture and design, which integrate creative elements into wider processes, as well as subsectors such as graphic design, fashion design or advertising.

WHAT IS CULTURAL INNOVATION?

Cultural innovation is a process of change, based on strategies and ideas that lead to the development of a specific community in this area.

In Italy, the cultural and creative sector faced important changes in the last decade. Digitization is a transforming force for all sectors. It changes how products and services are create, how they are put onto the market and consumed.  This change is particularly accentuated in the creative industries. Consumers now expect to find information about media and entertainment on the Internet.

What is certain is that technology has made and will continue to make significant changes in the publishing industry. In fact, a new ecosystem is emerging that presents great opportunities. At the center of the most successful business models is the integrated consumer experience, increasingly achieved by new entrants on the market or by partnerships between new entrants and players already on the market.

And it is precisely by virtue of the fact that technology has also become part of the smallest urban system that this platform has been brought to life, and with it the desire to connect innovators with the challenges highlighted by companies active in the cultural and creative sector at national and international level.

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]]> Supporting regions and industrial stakeholders in international investment projects https://www.meta-group.com/impact-story/supporting-regions-and-industrial-stakeholders-in-international-investment-projects/ Mon, 08 May 2023 07:19:48 +0000 https://www.meta-group.com/?post_type=osf_portfolio&p=7824 The Regional Co-operation Networks for Industrial Modernisation Initiative (ReConfirm), is an EU funded action to assist European regions and industrial stakeholders in implementing international investment projects, under the Smart Specialisation Platform for Industrial Modernisation.

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ReConfirm assisted European regions and industrial stakeholders in implementing international investment projects

The Regional Co-operation Networks for Industrial Modernisation Initiative (ReConfirm), was an EU funded action to assist European regions and industrial stakeholders in implementing international investment projects, under the Smart Specialisation Platform for Industrial Modernisation.

 Support was provided to European regions and industrial stakeholders to connect, form partnerships and ignite joint investment projects to modernise industry together.
 
The support included:
• Mapping papers: to provide structured background for partnership activities;
• Collaboration LABs: to identify strategic areas of cooperation and first portfolio of investment ideas;
• Strategic workshops: to involving additional potential partners, finetune co-investment projects and pave the way for a final agreement.
 
ReConfirm filled a gap of focusing on the development of investments at international level going a step further from just “learning and exchange”.
 
ReConfirm has supported or directly organised 49 Partnership and 12 Matchmaking events. These brought together stakeholders from EU institutions, academia, private companies, regional authorities, clusters, technology centres, industrial associations and networks.
 
As member of the ReConfirm Consortium, META has facilitated the definition of investment projects of several Partnerships.
 

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]]> Platform to Help Startups Solve Social and Environmental Problems https://www.meta-group.com/impact-story/platform-to-help-startups-solve-social-and-environmental-problems/ Fri, 05 May 2023 10:12:57 +0000 https://www.meta-group.com/?post_type=osf_portfolio&p=7737 SocialChallenges.eu is the latest iteration of META's Innovation Platform, which uses challenge-based innovation to foster startups and SMEs capable of meeting Challenges, posed by organisations as diverse as city governments and private companies. 

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Innovative and successful Challenge-based innovation platform to help startups tackle social problems

SocialChallenges.eu is the latest iteration of META’s Innovation Platform, which uses challenge-based innovation to foster startups and SMEs capable of meeting Challenges, posed by organisations as diverse as city governments and private companies. 

Entrepreneurial solutions to social challenges

As its name suggests, SocialChallenges.eu focuses on helping startups solve social and encironmental problems. As it is a challenge-based innovation platform:

  • these problems are posted onto the Platform by Challenge Owners’ – public authorities, private companies and Third Sector Organisations.
  • ‘Solution Providers’ (startups, social entrepreneurs, etc.) then Pitch their solution in response

In the process, both Challenge Owners and Startups ‘put themselves on the map’, along with governmental organisations and NGOs, funding organisations, accelerators and incubators, and more, helping make the local innovation fabric easier to navigate, and hence more efficient.

Up to three Solution Providers per Challenge are chosen by a Jury to win a €30.000 grant and six months of mentoring to help them turn their idea into reality. The Challenge Owner then becomes their first client, and their Solution is promoted to similar Challenge Owners across Europe.

“The project therefore combines an innovative and highly interactive online platform with offline events and training to stimulate startups and solve social challenges.”

Successful launch, lessons learnt

 

Following the ‘lean startup’ methodology, the website was first launched in Beta over the summer of 2017, providing useful feedback for the official launch of the website – and the ‘first round’ of Challenges and Pitches – in September 2017.

A total of 30 Challenges emerged from over 19 cities and regions across Europe over the following weeks. Between them, they attracted over 223 Pitches from startups and social entrepreneurs. While this was actually more than expected, the results were variable – some cities generated many more Challenges than others, and some Challenges attracted far more Pitches than others.

Since then two more Calls have been launched – check out the website SocialChallenges.eu and subscribe to its SCHIP newslwtter to stay informed.

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]]> Capacity Building for Business Angels and Early-Stage Investors https://www.meta-group.com/impact-story/capacity-building-for-business-angels-and-early-stage-investors/ Fri, 05 May 2023 10:08:49 +0000 https://www.meta-group.com/?post_type=osf_portfolio&p=7734 ESIL is a Pan-European community aiming to improve angel investment market, stimulate cross border investment opportunities, find new deals, connect the most relevant networks and build a tailored training programme for local ecosystems.

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ESIL was a Pan-European community aiming to improve the angel investment market, stimulate cross-border investment opportunities, find new deals, connect the most relevant networks and build a tailored training programme for local ecosystems.

ESIL, the Early Stage Investing Launchpad, develops a capacity-building programme for early-stage investors in Europe, facilitated the take up of Angel Investing, overcoming obstacles related to market outreach and engaging key actors e.g., entrepreneurs, unconventional early-stage investors and crowdfunding.

ESIL provided a blend of online and offline activities, including high quality training materials, a powerful online networking matchmaking platform and access to the best practices and knowledge of the world’s most effective Business Angel and early-stage investors.

The programme was developed to create a dynamic investment environment by creating new leaders within the Business Angel and broader investment community, encouraging more individuals to become investors and improving the effectiveness of the investment process.

META coordinated this
programme in partnership with Business Angels Europe (BAE),
the European Business and Innovation Centre Network (EBN), the European
CrowdfundingNetwork (ECN), GoBeyond, BPI
France and LINC Scotland.


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]]> Exploring the Role of Innovation for Sustainability https://www.meta-group.com/impact-story/exploring-the-role-of-innovation-for-sustainability/ Thu, 04 May 2023 14:29:06 +0000 https://www.meta-group.com/?post_type=osf_portfolio&p=7526 CASI 2020 (Common Framework for Assessment and Management of Sustainable Innovation) focused on exploring sustainable innovation as a social phenomenon.

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Common Framework for Assessment and Management of Sustainable Innovation (CASI 2020) explored sustainable innovation as a social phenomenon.

CASI was a cross-sectorial project focused on the role of innovation in sustainability, and on enhancing the understanding of sustainability within the innovation context.

It involved organsations from 12 European countries, and collaborated with national experts from another 16. All are innovation and sustainability stakeholders: from researchers and academia through to citizens, focused on developing and solving innovation-related challenges across Europe. In this way, CASI integrated the perspectives of civil society, SMEs, industry, policy stakeholders, and leading academics, engaging them in focused debates on sustainable innovation.

Via a rich and intensive set of activities carried out across the EU underpinned by a carefully designed methodology, CASI identified and described sustainable innovation cases through a collaborative analytical process known as mapping.

Key points

  • Shared cross-functional understanding of sustainable innovation, integrating the perspectives of multiple innovation and sustainability stakeholders (policy formulation, academia, civil society and practitioners);
  • Common Framework for the Assessment and Management of Sustainable Innovation, reflecting expertise from various disciplines, the results of academic research, and lessons from practitioners’ experience;
  • A database of case studies on sustainable innovation across the EU;
  • Policy briefs: short policy-oriented briefs focusing on sustainable innovation.

Results: case studies, policy briefs, news, events, blog posts and more.

Over 160 innovative practices

META Group prepared policy briefs on sustainable innovation and organizes citizen panels in Italy, where citizens were invited to present their vision about the future of sustainable innovation. The collected feedback helped develop new EU policies on sustainable innovation, with the hands-on involvement of European citizens.

More than 160 innovative practices from around the EU provided a rich qualitative perspective. They served as the basis for focused analysis, and comparison, leading to a common framework for sustainable innovation in Europe.

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