Issue N° 125 - October 2014
Keep up to date on innovation matters worldwide with the INSME Association!
Dear INSMEnews Readers,
October, a busy month for all of you!!
Considering that the INSME Association is reaching again the 100-magic-line, let me stress that our variety is a big asset!
In this regard let me share the following:
“Accept what life offers you and try to drink from every cup.
All wines should be tasted;
some should only be sipped, but with others, drink the whole bottle.”
(Paolo Coelho)
Courtesy of: www.coalagiocattoli.it/
…and now as usual enjoy your reading!
Ms. Christin Pfeiffer
INSME Secretary General
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Following the first successful workshop that took place in Brussels, Belgium on the 13th of October 2014 organized in the framework of the Jeupiste Project, aiming at promoting EU-Japan cooperation in Science, Technology and Innovation (STI), INSME and the EU-Japan Centre for Industrial Cooperation organize the second Innovation Workshop on “Smart Communities in a Broader Term - Japan-Europe workshop for sharing ideas and experiences towards strategic partnership building”. The event will gather the most influential and forward thinking minds in the field of smart communities to encourage the discussion around relevant topics such as:
that will engage the whole audience into an open discussion.
Save the date on the 13th of November 2014 and join us in Turin, Italy in one of the most strategic places for the city and the territory: Lingotto Fiere.
The event will be made even more memorable as it will be held in connection with the Smart Mobility World, one of the most important European event dedicated to sustainable, connected and integrated mobility in the XXI century. In the evening of the 13th of November and in the framework of the Smart Mobility World, a matchmaking event will take place organized by the Torino Chamber of Commerce within the activity of the EEN. The matchmaking event will be a unique chance to develop synergies to enhance partnerships for future H2020 projects in the field of Smart, Green and Integrated Transport.
The event will be an opportunity to connect with creative minds from Fujitsu Laboratories of Europe, META Group D.o.o., T2I, the European Crowdfunding Network, Torino Wireless, Telecom Italia and many more.
Audience is limited to 50 participants. To register please send an email to eu-japan@insme.it with the following information:
More info available here.
INSME Secretary General, Ms. Christin Pfeiffer participated at the 2014 SME Assembly organized by the European Commission. The 400+ participants event took place in Naples, Italy from the 1st to the 3rd of October 2014.
The conference under the theme “Growth Through Enterprise: Exploiting the Opportunities Ahead” attracted SMEs, business organizations, European, national and regional governments, media and relevant stakeholders to discuss and share ideas on how to foster European economic growth by enhancing entrepreneurship and business opportunities.
Find out more here.
INSME President, Mr. Andrea Di Anselmo took actively part in the World Entrepreneurship Forum from the 19th to the 22nd of October in Lyon, France. The event brought together 250 participants from 60 countries with the aim to promote the development of entrepreneurship creating wealth and social justice by finding entrepreneurial solutions and promote the entrepreneurial spirit in all fields of society.
Mr. Di Anselmo served as a panelist in the session “Convince and Influence: Develop your Entrepreneurial Toolbox on the art and practice of Pitching 3.0” with representatives from relevant organizations from the Philippines, Lebanon, France and Bahrain.
Find out more here.
INSME took part at TO DESIGN on the 10th and 11th of October, a unique initiative organized by the Chamber of Commerce of Turin and Unioncamere Piemonte (INSME Member), in the framework of Operae, a festival dedicated to independent design.
TO DESIGN featured a showroom of more than 200 designers and design-related businesses that within the two-days event - through a workshop on “Made in and Design - A strong and winning connection” and a B2B session - had the opportunity to discuss and network on relevant topics such as new business opportunities, creativity and design, potential connection with new markets and sectors.
More info available here.
INSME recently took part in the event “World Bank Procurement Policy Review: Phase Two - Consultation Meeting” organized by the Italian Trade Agency (INSME Member) on the 23rd of September 2014 in Rome, Italy. The initiative is part of a global consultation process that the World Bank kicked off in 2012 with the final aim of reviewing its policies and procedures for procurement.
The World Bank is conducting an important reform of its policies and procedures for Procurement considering its clients' changing needs. In order to better respond to proper clients the World Bank launched a consultation involving shareholders and stakeholders in order to receive inputs and feedback.
Read the whole INSMEInsights here.
The Chamber of Commerce of Cartagena
The Chamber of Commerce of Cartagena, Colombia, is a private not-for-profit association intending to promote regional development and serve the general interests of Commerce. In particular, the Chamber of Commerce of Cartagena aims at:
Read more about the Chamber of Commerce of Cartagena here.
The Triple Helix Association
The Triple Helix Association is a non-for-profit, non-governmental association aiming at advancing scientific knowledge and practical achievements related to all aspects of the interaction between academy-industry-government (Triple Helix) for fostering research, innovation, economic competitiveness and growth.
Its main activities include development and debate around top class scientific studies and cases, by means of conferences, special events, webinars and awards; additionally THA provides its members with dissemination and uptake of the scientific findings by means of publications, academic journals and thematic research groups. Finally it supports knowledge transfer by enhancing international exchange of scholars and the education of students, researchers and practitioners.
The THA is going to launch the new Webinar series 2014-2015, aimed at offering to its TH Community more frequent exchange and learning experiences supported by a selected panel of international experts. The series will be launched on the 4th November (6 pm CET) with the first title “From the ivory tower to the Entrepreneurial University: How to create synergies between research, teaching and practice”. This first webinar offers a very good introduction to the Entrepreneurial University concept and impact Entrepreneurial universities might have on knowledge-based regional development. For more information please visit the following link.
Read more about the Triple Helix Association here.
The INSME Association can count on the support of 99 Members from 44 different countries.
Mr. Rohit Shukla, CEO of Larta Institute (INSME Member) has been recently appointed to the U.S. National Advisory Council on Innovation and Entrepreneurship (NACIE).
The Council will operate as an independent entity within the Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship and its 27 members will have the crucial role to advise the U.S. Secretary of Commerce on important issues such as:
More information is available here.
In its continuous effort to promote and foster entrepreneurship, Potential (INSME Member) launched the Hadafi Entrepreneurship Program in 2013.
The program addresses women from the Middle East and North Africa who are willing to start a business or have started up a business in the last two years. The initiative will provide successful applicants with free training and first-hand entrepreneurial experiences from world class instructors to better access entrepreneurial resources and increase business opportunities.
Women entrepreneurs who are willing to apply for the program need to register by the 10th of December at the following link.
Mr. Bruno Grassetti, President of CEFORM (INSME Member) has recently received the Chinese Friendship Award from the Vice-Premier Ma Kai.
The Chinese Friendship Award is the People's Republic of China highest award for foreign experts who have contributed to the Chinese economic and social progress. Since 1984 Mr. Grassetti is involved in collaboration and project activities with several Chinese institutions such as the Chinese State Science and Technology Commission and is now collaborating with the municipality of Tianjin, Qingdao, Chengdu, Fuzhou and Hohhot in Inner Mongolia.
Avance is an “entrepreneurial game” promoted by SEBRAE (INSME Board Member), in association with ANPROTEC. By simulating entrepreneurial situations the game aims at stimulating business and entrepreneurial spirit. In particular the game addresses small innovative companies providing them with advanced knowledge and skills and enhancing their abilities in finding efficient solutions in each phase of the game. During the closing ceremony of the last edition of Avance that took place in the framework of the XXIV Seminar of Science Parks and Business Incubation, Carlos Alberto dos Santos, Technical Director at SEBRAE (INSME Board Member) awarded the winning team “Union” from de Municipal Business Incubator Sinha Moreira (Prointec) in Santa Rita do Sapucai (MG).
Receive more insights here.
“Innovating for Impact: the Millenium Development Goals (MDGs) and Beyond” is a jointly initiative of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and the UK Department for International Development (DFID) in partnership with the Governments of Australia and Sweden and the Omydiar Network aiming at stimulating the commitment towards the 2015 MDGs and renewing the development agenda.
At this purpose the Global Innovation Fund (GIF) has been launched to provide social enterprises, for-profit firms, non-profit organizations, researchers and government agencies working on breakthrough solutions to global development challenges with grants and risk capitals.
More information available here.
The Enhanced Private Sector Assistant (EPSA) launched in 2005 at the G8 summit is an innovative multi-donor, multi-component initiative for resource mobilisation and development partnership to support the Banks' private sector development strategy. It has three main components: the acceleration of co-funding for the public sector, support to the Assistance Fund for African Private Sector Assistance (APFA - launched in 2010) and loans to the private sector.
In this framework the African Development Bank and Japan recently signed a concessional loan for 300 million U.S. $ to support the private sector in Africa.
The agreement follows the Japanese intention to double its commitment to the EPSA from 1 to 2 billion dollars over the next three years. Through this commitment, the Japan International Cooperation Agency will provide direct lending to the Bank under the EPSA Non-sovereign Loan component and co-financing under the Accelerated Co-financing Facility for Africa (ACFA). Various projects have been endorsed for coverage under the NLS component of EPSA on different key sectors such as regional infrastructure in Nigeria, clean energy, microfinance and equity fund to invest in the Maghreb region. Additional projects are in the pipeline under the ACFA and NSL components of EPSA to ensure the achievements of the instrument's goals.
More information available at this page.
Is generating new ideas and opportunities the biggest challenge for an organization? According to Mr. Rowan Gibson - one of the World's foremost thought leaders on innovation and co-founder of Innovation Excellence - it is not. The No.1 challenge to innovation seems to rely on the capability of embedding creativity skills into an organization. The author states that the missing component in most companies today is the so-called “innovation-engine”: an organizational system that supports the creativity process and turns promising ideas into new ways of creating value and wealth.
Read the article here.
Companies are usually under pressure because of two simultaneous forces: deliver everyday commitments and invest in innovation opportunities that will secure tomorrow's success. Unfortunately most of the companies seem to be spending more than necessary on day-to-day operations rather than on sustaining and disruptive innovation. To rebalance this disproportion, Mr. Brad Power and Mr. Steve Stanton suggest that companies are supposed to do three things: segregate funds for improvement and innovation; identify the causes of day-to-day turbulence and addressing them in a systematic, sustainable manner to finally create new organizations and controls for innovation.
Learn how to prioritize your budget here.
In the first article published on the September edition of the INSME Newsletter, China IRP SME Helpdesk discussed trade secrets strategies for European ICT companies.
In this second part, property rights for ICT industries are discussed through the case study of InterDigital, Inc. a mid-sized U.S. wireless research and development company that has taken enforcement actions in China.
Read the whole article here.
INDIA SME Forum (INSME Member) has launched a television series in association with NDTV titled India's Small Giants (ISG) - Emerging Entrepreneurs of India. In order to identify companies to participate in the television series, the India SME Forum ISG committee is calling on all representatives from industry associations, public sector, banks, stock exchanges, technology companies and equity & venture companies to recommend companies and enterprises that particularly stand out for their achievements. A preliminary screening will be carried out by the Committee that will assess the company according to its financial situation, growth, people, social impact, CSR, branding and entrepreneurial impact. The shortlisting process will be followed by telephonic interviews and visits to the companies, in order to select the most successful enterprises for the television show. To today, INDIA SME Forum received 1600 recommendations and selected 40 companies.
To recommend an India-based company please click here.
To watch former episodes of India's Small Giants, please click here.
The ERANet-LAC project has launched a call for proposals to start new, sustainable and multilateral research cooperation between researchers from Europe, Latin-America and the Caribbean Countries. The call will fund two different initiatives:
1. Collaborative Research Projects designed to produce new knowledge through scientific research;
2. Collaborative Innovation Projects designed to bridge the gap between the outcomes of research projects and commercialization.
Proposals must be submitted by transnational consortia. Only researchers from the following countries/regions can participate in the call: Argentina, Belgium, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Dominican Republic, France, Germany, Mexico, Norway, Panama, Peru, Portugal, Romania, Spain, Turkey and Uruguay. Researchers from other countries/regions may also participate under special conditions.
The overall budget of the call is the sum of the individual budgets allocated by each participating funding institution and the deadline for submitting proposals is the 27th of November 2014.
Read the call for proposals here.
The European Commission has launched a call for twinning in order to address networking gaps and deficiencies between the research institutions of the low performing Member States and regions and internationally-leading counterparts at EU level. Successful proposals should underline the strategy used by the consortium to stimulate scientific excellence and innovation capacity in a defined area of research as well as the scientific quality of the partners involved in the twinning process. Additionally proposal should also point out how the twinning exercise will contribute to the overall Smart Specialization Strategy of the location of the initiating institution. To do so measures under this call should include the following activities: short term staff exchanges; expert visits and short-term on-site or virtual trainings; workshops; conference attendances; organization of joint summer schools; dissemination and outreach activities.
The total call budget is € 65,270,000 and the deadline for submissions is the 5th of July 2015.
Read more about this call here.
Google Cloud Platform is a new initiative developed by Google which allows developers to build, test and deploy applications on Google's highly-scalable and reliable infrastructure for web, mobile and backend solutions. Through the power of Google Cloud Platform, users will have access to the network, compute and storage that runs all of Google's infrastructure. The platform offers a way that matches and combines eight application programming interfaces and services to fit the users' application needs. Applications hosted on the Cloud Platform can automatically scale up to handle the most demanding workloads and scale down when traffic subsides.
Startups eligible to benefit from this service need to meet the following criteria:
Read more about it here.
Building on the macroeconomic data used in the World Bank Investment Climate Survey, this article of the African Development Bank underlines the key determinants of innovation and their impact on the performance of firms in three North African Countries (Algeria, Egypt and Morocco) while highlighting the role played by economic openness, the institutional environment and qualifications of human capital. According to the report, firstly it is necessary to create synergies among the different actors of the national systems of innovation in order to kick off the necessary reforms that will in time help to activate all factors of innovation. Furthermore it is essential to develop the quality of projects and programmes of educational and research institutions, as well as to align them with the needs of firms, especially in the new strategic areas. Finally North African Countries shall reconsider their strategies related to FDI. It is necessary to improve the investment climate and support it by more advantageous incentives to innovating investors.
Click here to read the article.
The 2014 edition of the European Competitiveness Report, released by the DG Enterprise and Industry of the European Commission, focuses on important factors and drivers of firms' growth such as the role of access to different forms of funding, the policies that help small and new firms expand their operations to new markets, the role of public administration, the role of innovation and finally, the importance of energy costs for EU firms' export performance. In particular the report shows that since 2008 the proportion of bank-loan applications that are successful has dropped dramatically in the EU with large differences across countries, thus demonstrating the need for SMEs to access external finance for investment. As a driver of competitiveness, the report also identifies what helps firms to expand their activities across national borders. It shows that policies targeting the business environment with respect to access to capital, skills support for innovation and actions to enhance productivity are important to help small firms expand exports. This year's edition also contains a chapter on energy costs and energy efficiency, including an assessment of the importance of energy costs in relation to other costs, across manufacturing in general as well as for energy-intensive industries.
Learn more here.
ELLA is a virtual window into Latin American development experience and knowledge. It is a knowledge sharing and learning platform, funded by the UK Department for International Development that offers access to knowledge of recent Latin America development experiences, supports learning between Latin America, Africa and South Asia countries and provides a networking platform for organizations and individuals.
Learn more about it here.
The International Research Update Newsletter issued by the EU directorate for International Cooperation is published monthly and provides news and updates on International Research and Innovation. Additionally the newsletter contains a section dedicated to meetings and seminars that are relevant to themes of international research and innovation and a regular update on recent Research and Innovation policy news from R&I Counsellors in the EU Delegations of Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, Egypt, India, Israel, Japan, Korea, Russia, the United States (US) and the African Union (AU).
Learn more about it here.
Global Entrepreneurship Forum3rd of November 2014
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1st - 3rd of November 2014
African Economic Conference: "Knowledge and Innovation for Africa's Transformation”
Organized by the African Development Bank Group (INSME Member)
Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire
4th - 6th of November 2014
EPO Patent Information Conference
Organized by the European Patent Office
Warsaw, Poland
5th - 6th of November 2014
ISBE Conference 2014
Organized by the Institute for Small Business and Entrepreneurship - ISBE (INSME Member)
Manchester, United Kingdom
10th - 13th of November 2014
17th TCI Global Conference - Creating Shared Value through Clusters for a Sustainable Future
Organized by TCI
Monterrey, Mexico
11th - 14th of November 2014
2014 Daejeon Global Innovation Forum
Organized by World Technopolis Association - WTA (INSME Member)
Daejeon Metropolitan City, Republic of Korea
13th - 14th of November 2014
The 9th Colombian International Forum on Micro and Small Enterprises
Organized by PROPAIS (INSME Member)
Quindìo, Colombia
17th - 18th of November 2014
European Business Angels Conference
Organized by EBAN (INSME Member)
Helsinki, Finland
20th of November 2014
IP for SMEs Forum on “Building sustainable IP support services for SMEs”
Organized by European IPR Helpdesk (INSME Partner) and INNOVACCES
Brussels, Belgium
25th of November 2014
Strengthening Europe's Defence Industry - Dual use and smart clustering
Organized by the European Commission (DG ENTR), the European Defence Agency (EDA) and the European Association of Regional Development Agencies - EURADA (INSME Member)
Brussels, Belgium
4th - 5th of December 2014
Conference on the "Economic impacts of IP-centered government incentives in Europe and China”
Organized by the "IP Key” Project and the Chinese Academy of Sciences Institute of Policy & Management
Beijing, China
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The 2014 ISPIM Asia-Pacific Innovation Forum will be held in Singapore on 7-10 December 2014 and is co-organized by 
