The second Twinning Meeting of I AM GREEN project was held on Tuesday 27th of July 2021, and it was hosted by the Irish Partner Enterprise Ireland. The main goals of the event were:
- Designing two of the project pillars, namely “Needs Analysis” (Pillar 2) and “Training Programme” (Pillar 3).
- Creating a joint catalogue, from which the participants in the meeting could define the skills, knowledges, abilities that are behind the proposed training and education activities.
- Effectively implementing a widespread academy, by considering the actors gravitating around the incubator model and the synergies that could be created among them.
- Understanding the role of great companies when mentoring start-ups.
The main topics of discussion
The meeting opened with Professor John Breslin (National University of Ireland – Galway), who provided a general overview of what people think about innovation and presented his 5 S conceptual framework for start-up success: Spirit, Skills, Space, Support and Spondulix, i.e. financial support. During his intervention, he described the market segmentation of I AM GREEN customers and the main ingredients of the start-up ecosystem.
He was followed by Domenico Uva from Start-up Geeks, a community of Italian start-uppers and an online incubator, whose mission is to help entrepreneurs in transforming their idea into a business. He presented the practical support offered to start-ups at different stages, stressed the importance of clearly defining a programme, and emphasised the importance of getting entrepreneurs in the right mindset.
The third speech was held by Sarai Kemp, tech ventures capital specialist at Trendlines Agritech, who outlined the ideal framework for a start-up to get financial support, which is a combination of private equity, national and international and standardised subsides offered by the Israeli State. She also provided an answer to the question if investors are aware and value green motives.
From Italy, when heard from Cinzia Morisco, Innovation and Green Funding specialist, who presented the perspective of an accelerator like STEP Tech Park, and the activities they are currently promoting with the goal of achieving climate neutrality in 2050. STEP is an Innovation Hub that helps start-ups, researchers and technological pioneers to realize their green tech projects
The last intervention of the morning was the one from Nicola Doppio, Innovation Officer at HIT Hub Innovazione Trentino. He presented the work of HIT, which established an excellent collaboration between the region, local authorities, the University and foundations. Then he elaborated on the topic of innovation prizes, but that today have acquired a special relevance through dedicated INNOSUP projects and need to be effectively designed in order to reach their objectives.
In the second part of the meeting, three more speakers were invited to present the entities they collaborate in and to debate on a number of specific topics. The first one was Rosemary Ward, Start-up Business Consultant at South East BIC, who discussed extensively the support that South East BIC offers during the whole start-up journey, and questioned how to select the potentially successful start-ups and how to nurture them. She emphasised the importance of quickly getting to the stage of having an MVP (Minimum Viable Product).
Uriel Perman followed and shared the history of the Kinneret Innovation Centre in Israel in which a College of Engineering, agricultural companies and factories all cooperate. They also offer start-ups what they need, depending on their stage of development.
The final statements were made by Agnese Metitieri, trainer for Climate Impact Forecast (CIF) and circular economy consultant. CIF is an online tool which compares a baseline scenario of climate impact with the consequences of specific innovations within the start-up or company.