Starting new cooperative projects within Europe and thereby bringing innovation to South Tyrol: this was the aim of a three-day meeting of Project ClusteriX 2.0 in Malmö, with IDM South Tyrol as one of the participants. The goal of this EU-financed project is to create networks between industry, research and public administration in order to create renewed impetus for local businesses. After careful analysis of the South Tyrol model in April, participants at this conference now turned their attention to the Swedish version.
One of the main purposes of the workshop which took place last week in Malmö was to examine how businesses and clusters in the Swedish province of Skåne län (Scania County) are supported. In the course of the workshop, IDM South Tyrol (a special agency of the Province and the Chamber of Commerce), along with ten other partners from Sweden, Denmark, France, Rumania, the Czech Republic, Austria, Belgium and Italy, made a number of visits including one to the headquarters of Media Evolution City, a centre for firms involved in the multi-media industry, with facilities for co-working, seminars, conferences and network meetings.
The aim of the two-year Project ClusteriX 2.0, financed by the Interreg Europe 2014–2020 programme, is to support collaboration between clusters in different European regions through meetings such as this one in Malmö. “For IDM, the think tank for the South Tyrol economy, participation in EU projects such as ClusteriX 2.0 is especially important”, says Hubert Hofer, Head of the Development Department at IDM. “In this way, together with our European partners, we can extend our networks and give proper support to innovative South Tyrol firms that are intent on cooperation.”
Each of the projects presented by the ClusteriX 2.0 partners is focussed on the areas of excellence within the individual regions, which is in keeping with the spirit of the so-called RIS3-Strategy of the European Union. South Tyrol’s areas of strength are Energy & Environment, Alpine Technologies, Food Technologies, ICT & Automation, Creative Industries, and Treatments using Natural Methods and Medical Technologies. In these sectors, the so-called “regional eco-systems”, South Tyrol is looking for European partners for supra-regional cooperation projects, and hopes to achieve this by taking part in ClusteriX 2.0.
The South Tyrol strategy was presented at the first project meeting in April which took place in Bozen/Bolzano. After the preliminary introductions and presentation of the partners, and after electing a chair, the participants were able to gain an insight into the work of local clusters – for example by visiting “Under Construction”, a project in the Construction Cluster – as well as the NOI Technopark. “During this meeting of the ClusteriX 2.0 project, the partners were able to identify the potential of the various Clusters. This exchange of views resulted in international points of contact and synergies being created, which local firms will be able to exploit,” explains Hubert Hofer. The results of the analyses from the different regions will be presented at the next meeting in October in Ostrava (Czech Republic).
