Improved Results in Innovation Support - transnational exchange and joint development between Innovation Infrastructure Organisations

October 2017 -
March 2021
Uncompleted
Policy area:
Innovation
1. Innovation 1.1 R&I infrastructures

IRIS

Business incubator organisations are crucial supporters for entrepreneurs, start-ups and small and medium sized enterprises that drive economic growth and create jobs. In the project, incubators from all countries around the Baltic Sea work together to improve and strengthen their management and support capacity, i.e. to jointly nurture new skills, help create new companies, and to support in opening up new markets.

Summary

Relevance – what to achieve?

Incubators are organisations to boost innovation and entrepreneurship. The IRIS project strengthens management and support capacity of incubators in the Baltic Sea region in order to enhance the incubator performance, which leads to more surviving start-up companies and growing businesses. In this way, IRIS contributes to the development of the Baltic Sea region as a dynamic, innovative and business driven region.

Content – how to do it?

The existing incubator support instruments, which are shared and transferred among partners, are complemented by new instruments - developed and tested within the partnership. Additionally, guidelines of useful support instruments are made available outside the partnership. A “peer review”, defined as evaluation of work by professionals of similar competence, is used to enhance quality and improve performance of all IRIS project partners. Based on the conclusions from the peer reviews, a roadmap shall be offered to other organisations and policy makers in order to improve regional innovation systems. IRIS also supports the flagship project BSR Stars in its ambitions to develop a collaboration platform for incubators.

Partnership – who will do it?

The partnership comprises 14 incubator organisations from all countries of the Baltic rim, including Norwegian and Russian partners. The Nordic Council of Ministers is an Associated Partner to IRIS.

Highlights by mid-term:

Joint teams of IRIS partners have run on site peer reviews (evaluation of work by professionals of similar competence) for all 13 incubators involved in the project. The purpose of reviews was to improve quality and management performance by providing them with targeted recommendations for further development, so-called management improvement plans. Although the peer review method has not previously been used in a transnational context across the Baltic Sea region, it has proven to be robust and valuable, regardless of differences in structures, organisation, mission, stakeholders and ownership.

The IRIS workshop results dedicated to “High quality deal-flow to incubators”, “Coaching for growth and sustainability” and “Successful management in start-ups and SME’s” have enabled respective incubators to transform the discussed topics into offered market services.

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Budgets

Total
€ 2.46
million
Erdf
€ 1.80
million
Eni + Russia
€ 0.16
million
Norway
€ 0.00
million

PARTNERS

CONTACTS

Project manager

Dalarna Science Park

Erika Hinz

+46 705577767

Legal representative

Dalarna Science Park

Angelica Ekholm

+46 70209 82 17

Financial manager

Dalarna Science Park

Pasi Lampinen

0707875880

Communication manager

Dalarna Science Park

Patricia Eresjö

+46 706270082