Better Incubation Project Finale|Towards a more inclusive and impact driven approach to innovative entrepreneurship Posted on November 23, 2022December 1, 2022 by Better Incubation The European Action Plan “Building an economy that works for people: an action plan for the social economy “ (2021-2030) launched by the European Commission recognises the importance that the mainstream BSOs have in the support of social economy entities (p.14) : The Commission calls on Member States to encourage mainstream business incubators to extend their support to social economy entities, to improve business investment readiness support opportunities. The ‘Better Incubator’ pilot launched by the European Commission can serve as inspiration’ . Better Incubation aims to enhance the inclusiveness of BSOs by stimulating a wider cultural change in the incubation ecosystem, therefore involving regional and EU stakeholders (investors, policymakers, social actors, BSOs) that can contribute to this paradigm shift. After 2 years of project activities, it is time to share key learnings on how to boost the promotion and support of impact-driven and inclusive entrepreneurial ecosystems in Europe and beyond. Organised in the framework of the EVPA Annual Conference 2022, the session “Better Incubation: Project Finale | Towards an impact-driven and inclusive approach to innovative entrepreneurship in Europe” is structured in 4 key moments: How BSOs can contribute to the implementation of the Social Economy Action Plan? Brigitte Fellahi-Brognaux, Head of Unit, European Commission DG EMPL Beyond Better Incubation – Partner Networks’ reflections on the way forward A conversation with Tatiana Glad, IHUB; Roberta Bosurgi, EVPA ; Laura Lecci, EBN “Voices of Better Incubation” We’ll hear different experiences of Better Incubation. What did the programme offer to their orgnisations, their territories and communities? What are the plans for the future? Scaling Impact. Meet the Winners of the Better Incubation Contest 2022. We’ll discover the entrepreneurial journey of the three finalists of the Better Incubation Contest 2022| Scaling Impact. Their stories, their plans, their impact The session starts at 14.30 CET and it is going to be live streamed on Better Incubation Twitter account, LinkedIn page and EBN YouTube Channel. AGENDA Room Orangerie, on the 2nd floor & Live Streaming 14:30-14:40 Welcome and introduction about Better Incubation, Chiara Davalli, EBN 14.40-15.10 How BSOs can contribute to the implementation of the Social Economy Action Plan? Brigitte Fellahi-Brognaux, Head of Unit, European Commission DG EMPL Beyond Better Incubation – Partner Networks’ reflections on the way forward A conversation with Tatiana Glad, IHUB; Alessia Gianoncelli, EVPA ; Laura Lecci, EBN 15.10-15.30 “Voices of Better Incubation” moderated by Lucia Radu, Impact Hub We’ll hear different experiences of Better Incubation. What did the programme offer to their orgnisations, their territories and communities? What are the plans for the future? Francisco Pizarro, EU|BIC Fundecyt PCTEX Viktoria Soregi, IHUB Budapest Francesco Rocca, IHUB Lisbon Hrishabh Sandilya, EPIM Gerrit Jan van ‘t Veen, WorldStartup Kristian Mancinone, EU|BIC Associate ART-ER Nayla Attas, Impact Hub Global 15.30-15.50 Scaling Impact. Meet the Winners of the Better Incubation Contest 2022, moderated by Laura Lecci, EBN We’ll discover the entrepreneurial journey of the three finalists of the Better Incubation Contest 2022| Scaling Impact. Their stories, their plans, their impact. Fela Akinse Buyi, Founder Salubata Esra Arslan, Executive Board Member at İhtiyaç Haritası Needs Map Ondřej Kolařík, CEO and Co-founder ARBO Technologies 15.50-16.00 Closing session with the three partner networks
Empowering women through skills development | WEgate webinar Posted on November 21, 2022 by Better Incubation Women’s economic empowerment is a “transformational process” achieved through, among other things, skills training. At the same time, encouraging entrepreneurship and empowering women to become not only wage-earners, but also jobs creators, is one of the most impactful steps we can take in addressing some of the disparities we see today. The upcoming WEgate webinar (on 24 November on Zoom) will focus on a series of initiatives that support the skilling process for women in business. They will be presenting three good practices for skills development: DITA – Innovative platform for supporting your digital transformation, presented by Loredana Flego, NeroSuBianco TalentA – education and support programme for women farmers, presented by Margit Batthyány-Schmidt, Union of Hungarian Women National Platform for Women Entrepreneurship – connecting & empowering women entrepreneurs and stakeholders, presented by Emilija Andonova, Foundation for Management and Industrial Research REGISTRATION LINK Have a look to the Better Incubation Community of Practice on Women Entreprenurship for more info and details on the topic.
Better Incubation Newsletter #7 is out! Posted on November 16, 2022 by Better Incubation The seventh issue of the Better Incubation Newsletter describes the upcoming opportunities : Better Incubation Scaling Programme for the 3 finalists of the Better Incubation Contest 2022 Innovation, impact, SDGs, and inclusivity of innovative entrepreneurs – the story of the 2022 EBN Techcamp by Better Incubation Better Incubation facts and figures – key project highlights Better Incubation final event at EVPA Annual Conference 2022 Find out more information about Better Incubation news by reading the newsletter here : Better Incubation Newsletter 7_November 2022
Innovation, impact, SDGs, and inclusivity of innovative entrepreneurs – the story of the 2022 EBN Techcamp by Better Incubation Posted on November 7, 2022November 7, 2022 by Better Incubation Over 80 international business support experts, thought leaders, and innovation practitioners gathered in Lipica, Slovenia, for the 2022 EBN Techcamp powered by Better Incubation. Stemming from 26 different European and neighbouring countries, participants discussed the importance of diversity in entrepreneurship support. Techcamp showcased experiences and strategies and co-developed innovation support programs to give the European innovation ecosystem a competitive advantage by embracing diversity and an impact-driven approach to supporting (tech) entrepreneurship. It was held on the 19th and 20th of October in Lipica, Slovenia, to explore the European innovation ecosystem’s untapped potential in becoming more inclusive and diverse and how to re-strategize, upskill and expand business support services to service a new generation of impactful start-ups. It was co-hosted by EU|BIC Inkubator Sežana and was powered by Better Incubation, a project funded by the European Union Programme for Employment and Social Innovation. Inkubator Sežana is one of our quality-certified EU|BICS who decided to join the Better Incubation project. They quickly became an example for the community by designing a successful and effective incubation support programme for hearing-impaired entrepreneurs. Their motivation and success, as well as the celebration of their 30th anniversary, are one of the sources of inspiration that brought the EBN Techcamp to Lipica. The EBN Techcamp is the second of our yearly events and the one that most showcases methodologies, practices, techniques, and tools that the community can bring back to their country and region to better support entrepreneurial innovation. This year, our focus on impact-driven and inclusive entrepreneurship is in large part because we know the challenges the community is facing. We wanted to empower them with the tools that can bring long-lasting resolutions – by increasing the pool of entrepreneurs, diversifying the type of companies they support, and more completely investing in their region’s (sustainable and social) economic development. Laura Lecci, CEO at EBN As remarked by the EC and the OECD, inclusive entrepreneurship is an integral part of growth. A widespread business creation by people of all groups helps generate jobs and combat social and financial exclusion while stimulating economic growth. Evidence shows that women, youth, seniors, immigrants, and people with disabilities are often underrepresented in the entrepreneurial space and, on average, less likely to succeed in creating high-growth firms due to a lack of networks, and access to finance, and less adequate ways to gain skills needed grow a company. At the same time, social enterprises are longstanding agents of inclusive growth and have proved remarkably resilient in the face of economic adversity. By design, social enterprises address socioeconomic challenges in innovative ways and engage citizens to become part of the solution. Over 8 parallel deep-dive sessions, the 2022 EBN Techcamp offered EU|BICs, and BSOs a space to share, debate, and test practices, methods and tools for impact-driven and inclusive entrepreneurship promotion and support. Some of them resulted from the involvement of EBN and IHUB members in 21 Better Incubation pilots that led to new inclusive incubation programmes that involved more than 130 entrepreneurs over 6 months. Tools, methods, and recommendations have been shared during the Techcamp, and are also available in the Better Incubation Toolkit, the Better Incubation Collection of Best Practices, the Inspirational Videos, and the upcoming Better Incubation Insights Paper (focus on programmatic level) and the Better Incubation Roadmap (focus on organizational level). Photos by Jan Antonac from VSS Sežana There is evidence that business incubators and business accelerators can be effective supports for new and growing businesses, and evaluations suggest similar results can be achieved in business incubators that focus on supporting entrepreneurs from underrepresented and disadvantaged groups. The keys to success for these initiatives include offering strong preincubation services, building strong linkages with mainstream business support providers and investors, delivering support in flexible modules, and ensuring incubator staff is trained to support the targeted entrepreneurs. This year’s EBN Techcamp empowered its participants to support a new generation of impactful tech start-ups – companies that are both profitable and work to improve society, operating ‘’double bottom line’’ business models – and to leverage diversity and inclusion and become relevant, competitive, and gain an advantage. Cristina Fanjul, President of EBN The event counted on the contribution of many local and international speakers who shared their experiences and best practices for innovation support. Speakers included: Dr. Aida Kamišalić Latifić, the secretary of state at the Slovenian Ministry of Digital Transformation, and David Škabar, Mayor of Sežana, who spoke of the importance of innovation and digitalization in Slovenia for its future; Cristina Fanjul, EBN President, Dorijan Maršič, Director at Inkubator Sežana, both addressing the importance of increased inclusivity for the future of European innovation and sharing their personal experience in the subject; and Tobias Temmen, Venture Partner at Kellogg-WHU, Stanford Change Labs, Andreja Jaklič, Professor at the University of Ljubljana – Faculty of Social Science, and Flora Rosenow, Global Brand Strategy & Communication for Impact expert, who lead workshops on the creation of incubation modules, guaranteeing its societal value from innovation ecosystems, and measuring and communicating its value to others – respectively. Better Incubation is a joint initiative of EBN, Impact Hub and EVPA, funded by the European Union, to kickstart an “eco-systemic” change by bringing incubation and business support services closer to society as a whole and to promote entrepreneurship and self-employment as means to create jobs, develop skills, and give the unemployed and vulnerable an opportunity to fully participate in the economy and improve the inclusivity of our societies (www.betterincubation.eu)