INFO Murcia action plan for scaling up of businesses

Murcia region action plan for scaling up of businesses: Inspiration from the Nottingham UpScaler practice, Interreg Europe funding

The Regional Development Agency of Murcia is currently leading and participating in the Interreg project called “SCALE UP 2019-2023: Supporting concentration and robustness of SMEs within the renewed EU industrial policy”.

For this reason, the staff of INFO have been working on the SCALE UP action plan that will finally address the Regional Operational Program of Murcia fostering the business spirit facilitating economic exploitation of new ideas and promoting the creation of start-ups through incubators.

The plan aims to improve the ERDF Regional Operational Program by including new projects through launching a new call to support SMEs in the growth process. It will also be integrated within the Entrepreneurship and Scaling Plan of the Region of Murcia, which is the main tool of the entrepreneurship and scaling policy in the Region of Murcia.

The plan contains a single action consisting of a training and a mentoring program. It is about promoting the scaling of 10 scalable companies per year by increasing training. This action will provide the entrepreneurs involved with vision related to the new paradigm of globalization, digitalization, and environment.

The training will consist of carrying out a series of workshops in different areas of strategic leadership, adapted to companies that have a certain degree of maturity, to provide entrepreneurs with skills that allow them to continue growing continuously while seizing new opportunities.

This training will be reinforced and specialized through mentoring sessions in which companies can be advised with individualized attention in areas they consider to be of great importance given their situation.

The first edition of the program will be launched once a year, with the first one in 2022. Other editions will be launched in the following years 2023, 2024, 2025. The duration of the program will be 3 months for the companies participating in it.

The companies that may participate in the program will be those that serve the following classification groups, according to the number of employees, turnover and sustained annual growth:

Consistent scaling companies;
Potential scaling companies;
Ambitious micro-businesses with tangible evidence of "scalability".

The dialogue on the needs and priorities in the regional environment, both internally and with the members of the Regional Action Group, resulted in the choice of the Nottingham UpScaler good practice, to be replicated in Murcia.

For the Scale Up project, the Regional Development Agency of Murcia contributed a selection of various initiatives related to scaling programs:

The line of Incentives for the Entry of Private Investors in recently created companies, which aims to support the financial needs of growing companies. This good practice has been replicated by our partners from Nottingham (UK).
The Tracción (Traction) program that connects young and entrepreneurial companies with the purchasing departments of large companies, so that collaborations can arise and stimulate the growth of both companies.
INCOOVA, a program financed by INFO and coordinated by CROEM, for the development of ideas and projects for the growth and development of talent. This good practice has been replicated by our partners from Lazio (Italy).
A scaling-up SEIMED program was carried out, focusing on Investment criteria in high-potential projects, with the aim of helping companies that are looking for private capital to prepare their investment proposal.