EcoRIS3 aims to promote better policies to generate solid interactions between key stakeholders, to orchestrate a sustainable innovation ecosystem responding to the existing challenges and gaps. According to this the Metropolitan City of Turin (CMTo) has been implementing three main Actions included in the Action Plan.
Action I - “One single strategic direction for the local S3 entrepreneurship ecosystem”- consists in improving the governance of the regional innovation ecosystem, by increasing the coordination among the large variety of actors that it involves, as well as in promoting a better coordination of the various initiatives that are aimed at it and that generate from different governance levels. To pursue this aim CMTo approved and formally presented a renovated Metropolitan Strategic Plan after a long and fruitful dialogue with the local stakeholders, identifying the measures that the local ecosystem needs the most for innovation. An important aspect of the Metropolitan Strategic Plan is Asse 1 (Axis 1), aimed at increasing the ability to create value in the different economic sectors through technology transfer, digitization, cooperation in business networks, and the promotion of the territory. The Metropolitan Strategic Plan lasts for three years, but is updated and implemented every year to better respond to the needs of the territory, strengthening the role of CMTo as the coordinator, facilitator and booster of the ecosystem.
Action II – “Research, Innovation and Territory Interaction Promotion” – aimed at supporting the local innovation ecosystem by fostering new and strengthened connections between research and business. The way the Metropolitan City intended to pursue this goal was by contributing at the designing of a framework for the co-management (based on the Quadruple Helix model) of a university space to be found in the new university campus under construction in Grugliasco, on the outskirts of Turin. On February the 2nd, 2021, Metropolitan City of Turin, the University of Turin, the Municipality of Grugliasco, the Piedmont Region, the Polytechnic of Turin, the Chamber of Commerce of Turin signed a Memorandum of Understanding.
The building of the new campus in Grugliasco started on the 8th of July 2021. The first steps for the establishment, inside the Campus, of the so-called “Butterfly Area” have also been taken. The Area will host enterprises, research institutes and public institutions, which will be able to work alongside researchers and students of the Campus, share access to laboratories and to the available equipment and obtain innovation support services. A Call for the manifestation of interest in the area was put forward by the University of Turin in October 2021: as of the 30th of May 2022, 270 entities have responded.
Finally, for its third Action – aiming at promoting a better coordination of initiatives in support of the creation and scale-up of micro-enterprises and start-ups – the Metropolitan City decided to focus on the health sector, which figures among the six Priority Systems of Innovation identified by the new regional S3 strategy.
The Pilot Action “E-health Territorial LAB – the local ecosystem as an instrument to scale up innovative local start-ups in e-health topic” was launched, with the support of Fomento San Sebastian. Its goal was that of testing a service for the monitoring of various health and physiological parameters of elderly people residing in the peripheral area of Val Cenischia through a native application developed by a local technology provider. Numerous stakeholders were engaged in the design and implementation of the Pilot Action – namely, CMTo and the municipalities of Val Cenischia, TOP-iX Consortium (the technical partner) and the University of Turin start-up incubator 2i3T (which identified the provider of the e-Health app to be used, TESISQUARE).
The Pilot Action was approved by the Interreg Europe Secretariat on the 20th of May 2020 and then implemented on the ground from May to August 2021. An evaluation phase ensued, which was officially ended by the final event that was held in Moncenisio on the 15th of November 2021. CMTo will put the experience gained through the Pilot Action to use by continuing working to foster e-Health innovation in the course of the 2021-27 programming period.
The Metropolitan City’s engagement as an orchestrator of innovation will continue in this next programming period, within the framework defined by the Metropolitan City’s Strategic Plan ‘21-‘23, by RIS3 Piedmont Region ‘21-’27 and by ERDF Piedmont Regional Program ‘21-’27.
For further information contact: Claudia Fassero, Head of EU and International Projects at Metropolitan City of Turin ([email protected])
