GRESS - GREen Startup Support
Programme: Interreg Europe
Lifetime: 01/08/2019 – 31/01/2023
Key words: green economy, blue economy, low-carbon economy, startup, start-ups, competitiveness, sustainability, SME, spin-offs, good practices, policy
Objective: Resource efficiency is one of the main drivers of companies’ competitiveness since European manufacturing firms spend, on average, 40% of their costs on raw materials, with energy and water pushing this to 50% of total manufacturing costs, compared to only 20% for labour. Consequently the need to promote a shift towards a low-carbon economy represents many business opportunities.
There are many good practice examples that build the capacity of green and blue companies, but unfortunately, many of these examples are not replicated in other regions and remain unexploited.
GRESS has a potential for providing European added value, by identifying good practice and then enabling interregional collaboration.
The objective of GRESS is to improve policies for SMEs' competitiveness by strengthening capacities to trigger and support formation of sustainable and competitive start-ups and spin-offs within the green economy.
The partners apply a policy-learning process, with the objective of improve policies and support schemes for SMEs competitiveness by strengthening capacities to understand, trigger and support formation of sustainable and competitive start-ups and spin-offs within the green economy, consequently benefitting a favourable business climate for SMEs.
The activities planned to achieve the objectives include exchange of experience, identify, validate, benchmark and transfer good practice, for example on approaches and methods to attract and mobilise green start-ups (e.g. through education, competitions, incentive schemes), on capacity building measures for green start-ups, on sustainable business models, on set-up a public support systems and on making public procurement of green products and services more attractive for start-ups and SMEs, on building stable cooperation between actors within the regional entrepreneurial ecosystems.
Partnership:
- Kristiansand Municipality, Norway (Lead Partner)
- Municipality of Piraeus, Greece
- Westpomeranian Region, Poland
- Metropolitan City of Bologna, Italy
- Foundation Cleantech Bulgaria, Bulgaria
Website: https://www.interregeurope.eu/gress/
Social: Facebook