Issue N° 116 - December 2013
Keep up to date on innovation matters worldwide with the INSME Association!
Dear INSMEnews Readers,
2013 comes to an end.
I hope it was a successful one for all of you.
May 2014 be even better by bringing you all happiness, health and positive moments with your friends, family, clients, business partners and network members!
Here comes my suggestion for the next year:
“Try a thing you haven't done three times.
Once, to get over the fear of doing it.
Twice, to learn how to do it.
And a third time to figure out whether you like it or not”
(Virgil Thomson)
*courtesy of: http://www.whdwallpapers.com/sparkling-stars-wallpaper/
Last but not least, let me renew the invitation to join us at the 10th INSME Annual Meeting from the 18th to the 20th of March at Abu Dhabi with the topic “Investing in Innovation: Building a Sustainable Knowledge-based Economy”.
We will continuously keep you updated through our INSMEnews concerning keynote speakers, the Innovation Tour and the International Expert Training.
...and now as usual enjoy your reading!
Ms. Christin Pfeiffer
INSME Secretary General
The INSME Team welcomes your comments and inputs for further improvement of this service.
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The 10th INSME Annual Meeting on “Investing in Innovation: Building a Sustainable Knowledge-based Economy” will be held from the 18th to the 20th of March 2014 at Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.
The agenda composed of four macro-sessions covering a wide range of topics such as “Entrepreneurship as a key-driver to innovation”, “Developing Innovative mind-sets in youngsters”, “Financial instruments to encourage innovative ventures” and “How challenges drive innovation”, an Innovation Tour, an International Training and an exhibition of local and international SMEs, seems to be the perfect recipe for a successful 10th Anniversary.
Don’t miss the opportunity to discuss most relevant topics, future trends and identify the right partners, clients or investors to make your business ideas become concrete.
For any further information, please contact 2014@insme.it.
The World Entrepreneurship Forum (UAE Chapter) took place on the 8th and 9th of December 2013 in Dubai, organized by Dubai SME (INSME Member).
The event, by bringing together entrepreneurs, experts, academics and policy makers, aimed at promoting entrepreneurial spirit in all fields of society and sharing ideas and best practices to develop new solutions and ensure collaboration in building sustainable entrepreneurial ecosystems in the MENA Region.
The event, via discussions and four policy labs, allowed participants to exchange ideas on relevant entrepreneurship-related topics and take back practical solutions that might be adopted with other participants in the coming years.
Mr. Andrea Di Anselmo, INSME President, actively intervened in the Forum as speaker.
Learn more about the event here.
The III Mesoamerican Forum of SMEs took place on the 28th and 29th of November 2013, in Cartagena/Colombia, organized by PROPAIS (INSME Member) in collaboration with the Colombian Ministry of Trade, Industry, and Tourism.
Under the theme "Innovation for micro, small and medium enterprises in a globalized world", the event aimed at offering SMEs a space to discuss and analyse topics of interest and provide innovative tools that enable SMEs to meet the demands of today's world and become more competitive.
The 8th Forum of Micro and Small Enterprises took place within the framework of the event.
Ms. Pfeiffer, INSME Secretary General, actively intervened in the Forum.
Learn more about the event here.
The ANIMA Investment Network (INSME Member) recently issued a new report on “Emerging Countries: the new Mediterranean FDI providers?” highlighting the fact that after two extremely difficult years of struggles on the political and global economic fronts, 2012 was the 4th best year for MED countries in terms of FDI attraction over the past ten years.
All countries, except for Syria, recorded very encouraging results, thanks to - among other factors -some major projects announced in Algeria, Egypt and Turkey. Despite the positive results, the transitions seem to have triggered a redistribution of investment sources. Europe’s leadership is increasingly threatened by investors from emerging countries. In terms of share in FDI, Europeans only account for 26% of the total in 2012, far behind the amounts announced by emerging countries (including the BRIC countries) which have announced several large scale projects (over € 1 billion) in the banking, telecommunications and tourism sectors, in Turkey, Egypt or Algeria.
Read the whole report here.
WIPO (INSME Member) recently launched WIPO Green, a new interactive marketplace that brings together a wide range of players in the green technology innovation value chain and connects owners of new technologies with individuals or companies looking to commercialize, license or otherwise access or distribute a green technology.
The platform gathers technologies at all stages of development, from upstream research to marketable products (and everything in between). These technologies are available for license, collaboration, joint ventures and sale with the aim of accelerating innovation and diffusion of green technologies and contributing to the efforts of developing countries in addressing climate change. The WIPO Green database is freely accessible only requiring a one-time registration here.
Learn more about the initiative here.
The world's five largest Intellectual Property Offices (IP5), the European Patent Office (EPO), the Japan Patent Office (JPO), the Korean Intellectual Property Office (KIPO), the State Intellectual Property Office of the People's Republic of China (SIPO) and the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) - agreed on launching a comprehensive IP5 Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH) pilot programme as of January 2014. The programme will utilise both the Patent Cooperation Treaty and national work products and will improve the accelerated treatment of patent applications.
The most beneficial advantage for applicants under the programme is that patent claims that have been found to be patentable by one office may ask for accelerated processing of their corresponding applications pending at the other IP5 offices.
Details and requirements for participation in the IP5 PPH pilot programme will be announced soon on the IP5 Website.
The European Commission recently welcomed the adoption of the Programme for Competitiveness of Small and Medium sized Enterprises - COSME, which aims at easing the access to credit problems that small businesses currently face.
With a € 2.3 billion-budget over the period 2014-2020, the programme will guarantee facilities for loans to small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) of up to € 150.000. In addition, COSME will assist businesses and citizens in the following ways: 1) entrepreneurs will benefit from easier access to markets in the EU and beyond, 2) citizens who wish to become self-employed, but currently face difficulties in setting up or developing their own business will receive tailored services and assistance, and 3) Member States' authorities will be better assisted in their efforts to elaborate and implement effective SME-related policy reform.
Learn more about COSME here.
In a globalised work environment having a multinational team is becoming the norm, but - according to Caroline Hook - leaders’ cultural origins may influence how they interact with their employees. To be effective in leading a global team, managers must then be able to pay attention to their cultures, embrace individual differences and pulling the right levers at the right times to get the best out of a team.
Read more about it here.
In the last five years angel investors have come down from the clouds by being deeply involved in investing in start-ups. But according to Joanne Cleaver, as with all investment the devil is waiting in ambush for angels to make a mistake. This article provides the reader with down-to-earth tips that will help you sort through the if, how and when of becoming an angel investor.
Read more here.
The European Commission recently launched a new call for projects aimed at encouraging entrepreneurs who use web and mobile technologies as main component in their innovation, to start a business in Europe and scale it up.
The main objectives of the “Web Entrepreneurs Challenge” are:
The expected impact is to support the creation of a dynamic European eco-system for web entrepreneurs, in particular for those contributing to the creation of specific web entrepreneurship policies and to implement the Startup Europe Initiatives.
The budget available is 10 Million € and the deadline for submission is the 23rd of April 2014.
More info at this page.
The European Commission announced a call for experts to assist Commission services with tasks regarding the Horizon 2020 Framework Programme.
The selected experts will assist or advise the European Commission in different tasks such as:
Experts are expected to have a high level of professional experience in relevant areas such as Future and Emerging Technologies, Innovation in Small and Medium sized Enterprises and leadership in enabling and industrial technologies.
Early application is encouraged, as the Commission or relevant funding body shall make use of the database of independent experts for its first proposal evaluation sessions under Horizon 2020, expected for the beginning of 2014.
If you are interested, please find more information at the following webpage or apply here.
The Committee of Regions launched the 2015 European Entrepreneurial Region (EER) Award which aims at identifying and awarding cities and regions with the most forward-looking entrepreneurial vision in Europe realized through concrete and measurable actions contributing to the implementation of the Small Business Act for Europe and by making optimal use of public funding.
All EU regions endowed with competences at a political level and able to implement an overall entrepreneurial vision are welcome to participate. "Regions” are defined in the broader sense as regions, Länder, communities, autonomous communities, departments, provinces, counties, metropolitan regions and any other political level with relevant competences to accomplish their engagements.
The city or region with the most convincing strategy will be awarded as "Entrepreneurial Region of the year".
The deadline for application is the 31st of March 2014.
For more information please send an e-mail to eer-cdr@cor.europa.eu or visit the official website.
Google and General Assembly - established in early 2011 in New York City - announced a free course for aspiring tech entrepreneurs to be run online from January to March 2014 with weekly meet-ups.
The introduction to the Startup Entrepreneurship course will take emerging entrepreneurs through how to develop an idea, design and branding, collaborating with developers and marketing.
General Assembly will select ten start-ups that will take part in a two-days mentoring program as part of Google Bootcamp at the end of the program.
If you are interested to enroll, visit the following webpage.
Euromonitor International released a new white paper on “Reaching the emerging middle classes beyond BRIC”.
The paper analyses the rise of emerging economies and the central role of middle classes in these areas. The authors underline key factors that companies must consider to successfully remodel their strategies, in order to access the enormous potential of emerging economies and above all of middle class consumers beyond BRIC.
In particular the report suggests seven strategies to reach the emerging middle classes, among which how to build well-designed and locally-tailored products, how to market the product as well as the associated lifestyle and how to find the right local partner.
The full report is available here.
The UNCTAD published the eleventh Investment Policy Report, which focuses on investment policies from January to October 2013.
The report states that the overall share of more restrictive or regulatory investment policies continued to increase. However, looking only at the developments in the last couple of months (review period June-October 2013), countries in their majority sought to attract more FDI through improving entry conditions, the treatment of established investors and investment promotion and facilitation. In addition, in light of economic crisis and persistently high domestic unemployment, a number of countries no longer only seeks to promote inward FDI, but is also keen that existing investments (and related jobs) do not move away. In addition, some governments have started to induce domestic investors to repatriate their investment abroad.
Download the report here.
The European Commission, DG Culture and Education and the OECD Leed Forum launched HEInnovate, a self-assessment tool for Entrepreneurial Higher Education Institutions looking for advice, ideas and inspiration on how to manage entrepreneurial institutional and cultural change. The framework has the simple purpose of helping Higher Education Institutions identify their current situation and potential areas of action, taking their local and national environments into account.
The website is designed to help interested organizations to benchmark themselves against statements under the following seven areas:
Further information are available on the official website.
The European TMDN News is a newsletter released by the European Trade Mark and Design Network focusing on the intellectual property community and the latest news on the European TMD Network.
In the first edition it is possible to read about the Back Office project, the Terminology Maintenance Console, the Quality tool and all the latest news from the EU National IP Offices.
The issue, published in English, will be available in 23 languages soon.
To read the newsletter visit the following webpage.
The OECD Leed Programme (Local Economic and Employment Development) organizes a workshop on "Potential of social enterprises for job creation and green economy - how to stimulate their start and development?" in collaboration with the DG Employment of the European Commission. The initiative, taking place in the framework of the event organized by the European Commission on "Social entrepreneurs have your say. Empowering social entrepreneurs for innovation, inclusive growth and jobs", will be held in Strasbourg on the 16th and 17th of January 2014. The workshop aims at creating an interactive learning environment in order to exchange knowledge and good practices regarding the role of social enterprises in job creation. Special emphasis will be given to the role of social enterprises in the green economy.
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14th of January 2014
TII Project Lab/Horizon 2020 Meeting
Organized by TII
Brussels, Belgium
16th - 17th of January 2014
Conference on Social Entrepreneurship and Social Economy
Organized by the European Commission and the European Economic and Social Committee
Strasbourg, France
21st - 23rd of January 2014
ASEAN-EU Science, Technology and Innovation Days 2014
Organized by SEA-EU-NET Partners in Science
Bangkok, Thailand
29th of January 2014
Green Growth, Green Jobs: Integrating Employment and Environmental Policies Across Europe
Organized by Public Policy Exchange
Brussels, Belgium
12th - 13th of February 2014
1st Euro-Mediterranean Brokerage Event on Research and Innovation
Organized by the ANIMA Investment Network (INSME Member), Ministry of Scientific Research (Egypt), in collaboration with the Agronomic Institute of Bari (CIHEAM-IAMB, Italy) and the Malta Council for Science and Technology
Cairo, Egypt
20th of February 2014
The 12th Annual European Financial Services Conference
Organized by Forum Europe
Brussels, Belgium
10th - 11th of March 2014
Innovation Convention 2104
Organized by the European Commission
Brussels, Belgium
13th of March 2014
Innovating Method: Researching Gender and Entrepreneurship
Organized by the Institute for Small Business and Entrepreneurship (ISBE)
Belfast, United Kingdom
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