A Digital Innovation Hub (called DIH4S) by Cluj IT Cluster under the CRONOS project was launched in Romania, financed under a national scheme of the Ministry of Research and Innovation, which supported innovative clusters to foster the structural transformation of national industry, having also as initiators: the Technical University of Cluj-Napoca and Chamber of Commerce and Industry Bistrita-Nasaud, with the support of the North-West Regional Development Agency.

DIH4S is a Digital Innovation Hub located in the North-West Region of Romania, with the headquarter in Cluj-Napoca, with local offices in the capital cities of all counties in the region: Oradea, Bistrita, Baia-Mare, Satu-Mare and Zalau, as well as with contact points in several capital cities of the Transylvania macro-region of Romania, such as Sf. Gheorghe, Brasov, Sibiu, Alba-Iulia, Suceava and Petrosani, and with close collaboration with some central institutions from Bucharest. Its mission is to facilitate and accelerate digitalization and digital transformation in the region, as well as to contribute to the creation and consolidation of the international networking of our region with other national and European regions in the field of digital innovations.

DIH4S is approved as “fully operational” Digital Innovation Hub in the network Smart Specialization Platform of European Commission. There are many moments and situations in the journey of digital transformation which are not covered by the mainstream solution providers, either because of too high risks, low predictability of demand, ambiguity, volatility, occasionality of demand, unattractive market size or several other similar reasons. These gaps are covered by DIH4S using a proven open innovation business model, enabled by a pool of critical mass of hireable talents, services and infrastructure, as well as customizable digital solutions from a network of specialized organizations, in order to rapidly setup, calibrate and activate customized solutions for every specific or unique request. The value-to-market of

DIH4S comes from:

- Optimal Expertise - DIH4S comprises a large amount of professional expertise in digitalization and digital transformation, 80 IT companies being behind the DIH4S ecosystem, and their number is constantly growing.

- Complete solutions - Digitalization and digital transformation is more than simply implementing an IT solution in the company. It requires a robust and comprehensive approach to understand priorities, to build up a strategy and a business plan for investing in digitalization, to transform your processes, and sometimes to reshape and reinvent your business model in order to benefit at high levels from digitalization, as well as to consider an integrative approach. - Transparent Services - approach is gradual, following the DIH4S’s original 8-D innovation cycle: discover – define – develop – delivery – deploy – disseminate – delegate – disrupt.

- Customized solutions - DIH4S is ready to tackle every digitalization project from a personalized point of view without affecting the budget of the project. - Latest innovations – DIH4Society benefits of a large pool of solution providers, which gives the opportunity to be connected to the latest technological innovations.

- Life-Cycle approach - DIH4S is a trustworthy partner to assist the companies in their Journey on the way of Digitalization and digital transformation, which is a long-term one.

- Proven Good Practices - have the capacity to select the most appropriate roadmap to tackle any particular problem.

- Success Stories - Benefiting of a very wide pallet of experts and solution providers in our network, chances to have already implemented similar solutions somewhere else are very high.

- Diversity - DIH4S operates as a “supermarket” (one-stop shop) for any need you have in relation with digitalization. The Hub for Digital Innovation DIH4S has the capability, through its ecosystem of solution providers, to support applied projects and use cases on a wide range of digital innovations. In order to create the proper context for adoption of digital innovations in various social and economic sectors, DIH4S also comprises stakeholders from financial bodies, public organizations and professionals.

More information on DIH4S can be found here