The Horizon 2020 work programme names the lack of innovation management capacity as “…an important barrier to creating economic impact…” and accordingly as a significant challenge for innovative SMEs. The problem is exacerbated by the fact that consulting services to address these gaps are either not sufficiently available in certain regions, not affordable or not sufficiently tailored to the specific needs of SMEs. In the course of this action, the Austrian consortium will support SMEs in addressing these factors hindering successful innovation cycles. Activities will be targeted at enhancing the innovation management capacity (EIMC) of SMEs and at providing substantial consulting and support services in the form of key account management (KAM) to beneficiaries of the Horizon 2020 SME instrument. The support will be delivered by experts well experienced in innovation related issues, working for the major innovation and research promotion agencies in Austria. Services will be provided in close cooperation and coordination with the National Contact Points and major regional and national stakeholders, guaranteeing a holistic approach and a high quality of services promoting the successful introduction of Austrian innovations to the European and international market.

A lack of innovation management capacity represents an important barrier to creating economic impact from innovation activities in SMEs. The Horizon 2020 Work Programme “Innovation in SMEs” therefore foresees support services for SMEs via the Enterprise Europe Network addressing this specific issue. The Austrian consortium will support SMEs in addressing factors hindering successful innovation cycles. Activities will be targeted at (1) providing substantial consulting and support services in the form of key account management (KAM) to beneficiaries of the Horizon 2020 SME instrument and at (2) enhancing the innovation management capacity (EIMC) of SMEs. Services will be provided in close cooperation and coordination with the National Contact Points and major regional and national stakeholders, guaranteeing a holistic approach and a high quality of services. (1) Within the frame of the SME instrument, partners will conduct company assessments, identify weaknesses in the SMEs’ innovation strategies and subsequently help SMEs to assign professional coaches. These coaches will then jointly develop a coaching plan with the SME and address these weaknesses. This process will be facilitated and accompanied by the Enterprise Europe Network expert. Further support (e.g. the link to additional financial resources) will be provided and the SME thereby receives a vital consulting service free of charge throughout the SME instrument project. (2) In addition to the SME instrument, the partners will directly support a selected number of high-potential SMEs in improving their innovation management. This will be achieved through targeted innovation management consulting by senior staff members of the consortium. Thereby, SMEs in need of this specific type of consulting will be reached, which may not benefit from the H2020 SME instrument while still showing a high potential for successful market introduction of innovations and international growth.

It is the aim of PERMIDES to strenghten the competitiveness and foster the innovation potential of Personalized Medicine as an Emerging Industry in Europe by providing key solutions for the reconfiguration of the biopharmaceutical value chain towards a Health Economy 4.0 with a special focus on oncology (i.e. cancer treatment). Current value chain challenges lie in e.g. data gathering and exchange, big data and machine learning, or new software-based marketing methods based. Via a cross-clustering approach, leading biopharma and IT clusters from three countries (Austria, Germany and Norway) will create novel cross-sectoral collaborations between SMEs to address innovation barriers in the biopharma sector via cutting-edge IT solutions. As a cross-cutting industry, the ICT and software sector is an enabler of innovation in many industries and therefore provides a broad knowledge base of processes and best practice solutions in diverse industrial contexts and business environments. PERMIDES will create an collaboration space consisting of workshops, a semantic online matchmaking portal complemented by matchmaking events that will allow biopharma enterprises to identify the most suitable ICT company from the participating clusters. In a second step, the biopharmaceutical SME and the ICT partner will jointly tackle an innovation barrier in the value chain using an innovation voucher scheme. Follow-up coaching and transfer activites by the cluster organisations will maximise the effect of around 90 collaborative projects that PERMIDES aims to achieve.

A lack of innovation management capacity represents an important barrier to creating economic impact from innovation activities in SMEs. The H2020 Work Programme “Innovation in SMEs” foresees support services via the Enterprise Europe Network dealing with this issue. The Austrian consortium will support SMEs in addressing factors hindering successful innovation cycles. Activities will aim at (1) providing substantial consulting and support services in the form of Key Account Management (KAM) to beneficiaries of the EIC Pilot and at (2) enhancing the innovation management capacity (EIMC) of SMEs. Services will be provided in close cooperation and coordination with the National Contact Points and regional and national stakeholders. KAM and EIMC services will be carried out by experienced innovation experts that are all also involved in/closely connected to the provision of EEN services. This guarantees a seamless support via the services provided under H2020 and COSME, using synergies but avoiding the duplication of services. (1) Within the frame of the Key Account Management, partners will conduct company assessments, identify weaknesses in the SMEs’ innovation strategies and subsequently help SMEs to assign professional coaches. Coaches and SMEs will then develop a coaching plan and address these weaknesses. The process will be facilitated and accompanied by the EEN expert. Further support (e.g. the link to additional financial resources) will be provided and so the SME receives a vital service throughout the project. (2) EEN experts will also directly support a selected number of SMEs in improving their innovation management. This will be achieved through targeted innovation management consulting. SMEs in need of this specific type of consulting will be reached which show a high potential for successful market introduction of innovations and international growth..

The overall goal of SCALE-UP is to support regional multi-actor partnerships, consisting of private businesses, governments and policymakers, civil society organisations, and researchers in identifying and scaling-up innovative and sustainable bio-based value chains that build on regional resources. Through its approach, SCALE-UP will adapt, implement and evaluate tools to help regional actors to overcome the apparent bottlenecks towards fully exploiting bioeconomy potentials in their region. A four phase methodology will: i) establish existing knowledge and set the stage for further research, as well as creating six regional platforms with local stakeholders; ii) facilitate cross-regional transfer of knowledge and demand-driven capacity building, and provide support to multi-actor partnerships to carry out market assessments and business model designs; iii) create a pan-European ‘Community of Practice’ to facilitate sharing good practices and lessons learned across European regions; and iv) disseminate and exploit project results in collaboration with key stakeholders. In addition to the focus on increasing capacity and knowledge on the bioeconomy among relevant actors in the regions, a key feature of SCALE-UP is the business development programme to be applied by the local communities. With an emphasis on the principles of co-creation, transparency and open innovation, the project will provide advisory support to innovators and regional stakeholders to assess market conditions, elaborate business plans and identify compatible funding sources for 12 bio-based solutions.