Supporting the capacity of SMEs to engage in innovation process is one the priorities for enhancing the competitiveness of SMEs. There are several ways for policymakers to act towards this objective. They can mainly be categorised as follows:

• Direct financial support through dedicated programmes, including e.g. vouchers, grants for innovation and transformative projects or subsidised loans aiming at reducing the risk for significant investments.
• Providing support services, including training, on different aspects of innovation processes and innovation management such as intellectual property management, innovation methods, technology transfer…
• Creating supportive environments, aiming at promoting on a large scale a culture of innovation, developing networks and clusters leveraging the innovation capacity of their members, and facilitate the access to research and innovation infrastructures commonly not accessible to single businesses.

The workshop will focus on innovation-supportive infrastructures, which are increasingly being used to address the complexity of technology-based innovation processes induced by the convergence of new technologies, including digital technologies, and the fast-pace of innovation in general.

Those infrastructures take different forms and names: innovation hubs, innovation centres, living labs, etc. The aim of the workshop is to provide an overview of existing good practices, from the Interreg Europe community and beyond.

‍

You can register here

‍