On Social PARTEC
On Social PARTEC came about given the objective to understand the requirements in the entrepreneurship domain with a social impact (through both Social and Technological Innovation), but also how Science and Technology Parks can provide the most effective support to groups that are developing business initiatives with a twofold impact (social and economical), which will materialise thanks to four events being organised in June and September to cover the following themes:
16/6. An analysis of the requirements of both Social Entrepreneurs and the Social Innovation paradigm
21/09. Conclusions and action plans to promote the growth of Social Enterprises, and to revitalise Social Innovation generation
Seeking Ideas With Impact Competition
The Seeking_Ideas_With_Impact (BICI, in Spanish) competition addresses university community members at the Universitat Jaume I of Castellón who have an innovative, sustainable and viable entrepreneurship.
BICI intends to support university entrepreneurs via training and by selecting projects with a twofold impact (business and social impact) with experts in the entrepreneurship area, and also with support from the business, and public-private institutional sector.
This initiative is sponsored by the Castellón Council Offices through the On-Social PARTEC Project, and is organised by the General Universitat Jaume I Foundation.
How you can participate
Anyone interested in participating in the BICI competition must complete the form at https://goo.gl/forms/L8f90Sr4kkAwch943 and register their personal details and the title of the idea, and send to espaitec@espaitec.uji.es the following documents:
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A brief CV of the team members or of the organisation to which they/you belong
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An executive summary of the idea reflected in a Social Canvas (http://socialleancanvas.com/the-canvas/)
Any candidate idea for this competition must:
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Offer opportunities to solve the considered problem
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Have the potential to be transformed into future economically sustainable entrepreneurship
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Be transforming and different; i.e., it proposes something that has not yet been proposed and have very original content. Its innovation can be on a local, regional, provincial, national or international scale
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Have the potential to be scalable and have a strong impact
The deadline date to register is 23:59h 14 July 2017
Awards
The best idea with social impact will receive an award of €750, and there will be two €500 awards for the second and third best ideas.
Candidate ideas will be assessed on 20 July, during the third On Social event about Financing and Mentoring Models. The jury will be made up of experts in social entrepreneurship.
Candidates will present their candidacy in 2’ (2 minutes) in an elevator pitch format.
UNaLab project
Nature-based solutions for urban challenges
How can the cities of tomorrow respond to the climate change challenge in a sustainable way? EU project UNaLab aims to foster the development of an European Reference Framework for nature-based solutions. UNaLab will co-create and demonstrate locally attuned innovative water management systems in the context of an integrated urban ecological approach.
Aim of the Project:
Cities around the world are undergoing significant transformations and are becoming increasingly vulnerable to a multitude of risks linked to climate change and on-going urbanization. Nature-based solutions (NBS) present an approach to addressing urban challenges through working with nature, rather than against it, to achieve ecological and resilience objectives, while creating opportunities for social and economic innovation concurrently. The UNaLab consortium is comprised of 29 partners from 10 cities across Europe and beyond, including municipalities, research, business and industry. The UNaLab innovation action will generate a robust evidence base and develop a European reference framework on NBS containing information about the benefits, co-benefits, cost-effectiveness and economic viability of NBS. The Framework can be applied by regional and local authorities, communities, enterprises and other stakeholders to enable the development of smart, inclusive, resilient and sustainable urban communities.
Project Concept
The project concept is based on the validation of NBSs by implementing urban living labs demonstration areas in three frontrunner cities Eindhoven, Genova and Tampere. They will address identified urban climate- and water-related challenges by co-creating NBS with local stakeholders and end users, using an innovative systemic decision support tool. To ensure their replicability, these NBS will be coupled with innovative and cost-effective business models. Moreover, innovative municipal governance guidelines and decision-making schemes for enabling NBS implementation will be tested in the frontrunner cities. Subsequently, the five follower cities Ba?ak?ehir, Cannes, Castellón, Prague, and Stavanger will work in collaboration with frontrunner cities to develop individual NBS roadmaps in a co-creation approach. The non-European follower and observer cities Buenos Aires, Hong Kong, Guangzhou as well as the Network of Brazilian Intelligent Cities will actively learn from the European NBS approach and enable the creation a truly global NBS marketplace.
Project funded by:
The UNaLab project is funded by the European Commission in the framework of the Horizon 2020 EU Research and innovation programm and led by the VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland. It is supported by the Instituto Valenciano de Competitividad Empresarial (IVACE).
The Interreg iEER project to support young entrepreneurs
iEER is a star project financed by Interreg Europe that intends to promote collaboration between European and regional actors to define tools that allow an entrepreneurial ecosystem to be created among Public Administrations, Universities, companies and citizens. The ultimate objective is to improve not only support for young entrepreneurs, but also the quality of the structural services and funds designed for them.
The Valencian Community, awarded in 2015 as the European Entrepreneurial region, participates in the iEER Project along with eleven other regions and universities from Finland, Poland, Romania, Germany, Italy, France, the UK, Denmark and Ireland.
All these 11 regions constitute a Group of Local Agents formed by Public Administrations, universities, companies and society that represents the regional entrepreneurial ecosystem, and they participate in activities and exchange good practices. The Science, Technology and Business Park of the Universitat Jaume I and its linked companies have been invited to participate as innovative and entrepreneurial ecosystem agents from the province of Castellón.
iEER has two objectives. On the one hand, it intends to act as a platform for the co-learning and knowledge exchange between entrepreneurial regions to develop action plans to support young entrepreneurs through structural funds and regional programmes. On the other hand, it intends to integrate training with research and entrepreneurship by promoting the role of universities in transmitting skills and the entrepreneur spirit, supporting the generation of business ideas, and creating start-ups.
The Project lasts 4 years. The first 2 years are to exchange good practices with other participating regions. The last 2 years are to follow-up an action plan that improves support for young entrepreneurs by making the most of structural funds and European investment.
Visit the website of this Project
e’LivingLab
A Living Lab, an Anglo-Saxon term, is a new model in which all actors (state, production sector, the academic world and citizens) actively participate by adjusting open and collaborative innovation in co-creating and validating solutions that they themselves need, which constitutes an R&D ecosystem that enables permanent social innovation.
espaitec acts as a link with the Global Innovation System and a transducer between the academic world and companies by reinforcing their mission by providing an ideal setting in the province of Castellón called e’LivingLab. This is an instrument that, whenever possible, reinforces the development of competitive innovation in all the socio-economic agents in our province. e’LivingLab is a proof of concept that came about in 2010, and which will permit the methodology and some of the projects of the Living Lab at the Universitat Jaume I (Smart Campus) to be extrapolated to cities (Smart Cities) and to rural settings (Rural Labs) in the province of Castellón.
This project responds to the need to create areas of open and experimental innovation on the Universitat Jaume I’s (UJI) Campus de Riu Sec. It acts as a meeting point for students, researchers, companies and public administrations where new products and innovative services that constantly evolve and improve can be developed.
The e’Living Lab intends to be a cornerstone of a smart society (smart citizen) in the province of Castellón, with espaitec as the agent that drives both innovation and the generation of added value to constitute smart regions. Through Living Labs the interaction between innovation ecosystem agents is favoured, with three outstanding characteristics:
–It is MIMO (Multiple Input-Multiple Output) in nature
–Cross-pollination between the involved agents and organisations (inherited from the cluster model)
–Social capital is generated as a result of the knowledge and information exchange among all project participants (this is known as Knowledge Spillover, a typical effect of Science-Technology Parks).
Through the e’LivingLab we have formed part of ENoLL (the European Network of Living Labs) since May 2011. We are currently members of the management of this international network, which intends to connect all European living labs to form a community with over 300 members, and has designed a sustainable strategy to generate innovation systematically.
Collaborating organisations and sponsors
This programme has been financed by the Spanish Ministries of Science and Innovation and of Economy and Competitiveness through the INNPLANTA2010 programme. It is currently supported by the Generalitat Valenciana (Regional Valencian Government) in performing revitalising and diffusion actions in connection with the project.
Nowadays, several UJI research groups form part of espaitec’s e’Livinglab project, INIT, LABPSITEC, GID and E-BRICK, and some companies which have participated in several projects.
Further information can be found at:
The Climate-KIC Accelerator Programme
Climate-KIC is the most important initiative for innovation in the climate change domain in the European Union. It is divided into several pillars: The Valencian Association of Companies in the Energy Sector (AVAESEN) coordinates the entrepreneurial pillar in six European regions (RIC) in this programme. Through Climate-KIC Accelerator, espaitec acts as a collaborative organisation in the programme by mentoring several business projects.
The objective of this programme is to support the best start-ups in the Clean Tech field and to mitigate the environmental impact. Through this programme, entrepreneurs can gain access to not only a network of international Climate-KIC experts (coaching, mentoring, validating technology), networking and contacts to position their product on strategic markets, in the master class, but also to the European network of business angels and real investors.
Through collaboration with specialised centres such as the Science, Technology and Business Park of the Universitat Jaume I (espaitec), 30 new innovative companies in the Clean Tech sector have been able to make their business projects come true or accelerate their business by their innovation actually having an impact on the market and European society.
This programme has been developed in three phases: the model and business plan that must govern the participating start-ups were defined in the first one; the second phase saw this model being validated and connected to customers in order to finally, and thirdly, facilitate contacts with investors.
Apart from the Valencian Community in Spain, this programme has been developed in five other European regions in Hungary, Italy, Germany, Poland and the UK. Climate-KIC Accelerator is an opportunity to strengthen the innovation ecosystem related to climate change nationally by transforming our region, especially the province of Castellón, into a Clean Tech innovation hub by encouraging the creation of companies and by acting as a driver of wealth and innovation in our region because the companies chosen for the programme could develop their projects in the Castellón-based Centre For Energy Innovation and Sustainability.
Collaborating organisations and sponsors
The Valencian Community is one of the six EU regions that participate in this programme, led by IVACE-Energía, the AVAESEN Association and the Castellón City Council in collaboration with espaitec.
Further information can be found at:
http://www.avaesen.es/climate-kic/
http://www.climate-kic.org/for-entrepreneurs/
The European MIND (Marketing, Internationalisation & Development) Project
The MIND project is a training platform made up of educators, chambers of commerce, universities and companies which wish to develop and consolidate the capacities of the unemployed or recent graduates who are looking for their first job.
This project works on the following capacities:
- Supporting SMES to define:
Strategies to identify the target market/country to explore its products
Methods to enter and be correctly positioned in relation to the competition in the target country
The most suitable communication strategies
- Using appropriate tools to analyse the company’s internal and external setting, to evaluate market opportunities, to analyse competition, and to decide which strategies and tactics to use.
This initiative is in line with a European strategy called “Europe 2020 – A strategy for smart, sustainable and inclusive growth”, with the initiative “Europe 2020 – An agenda for new skills and jobs”, and also with the “Education and Training 2020” Programme (ET 2020).
Collaborating organisations and sponsors
This 2-year project is being carried out with the collaboration of the Salerno Chamber of Commerce (Italy), PRISM Consulting S.r.l. (Italy), FORMARE – Special Agency of the Milan Chamber of Commerce (Italy), the Barcelona Chamber of Commerce (Spain), the Athens Chamber of Commerce (Greece), the Lyon Chamber of Commerce (France), the Aydin Ticaret Borsasi Chamber of Commerce (Turkey), the Aydin Government (Turkey), The Andalusian Technology Institute (Spain) and the Hellenic American Union (Greece).
More info: http://mind.prismsrl.it/es/
The European NetMIB Project
During this process, professionals from the business world will participate as mentors of projects to generate new business models. Co-learning and co-creation processes will take place between members of the academic and business world.
The ultimate result of this project is to develop a set of tools to help entrepreneurs to strengthen them in their idea making, thanks to support from university community members and expert businesspeople to help them move on to a subsequent commercialisation stage.
Collaborating organisations and sponsors
This 2-year project is being carried out in collaboration with the University of Pécs (Hungary), the COTEC Foundation (Italy), North State Carolina University (USA), the South East European Research Centre SEERC (Greece), and with the University of Tampere and the Triple Helix Association (Italy).
