During the three-year INTERREG IVC funded Cleantech Incubation Europe (CIE) project, we have analysed some of the most successful cleantech clusters and incubators and compiled a list of best practice to help policy makers enhance the business conditions for growing environmental SMEs.
Clean technologies – green, sustainable products, services and processes – is a large and growing sector. Eco industries employ an estimated 3.4m people in the EU-27, and global eco industries has a turnover of around €1.15 trillion, with just over one third of that derived from the EU-27. The CIE project aims to support the entrepreneurs and SMEs working in this cleantech sector to stimulate and further accelerate growth.
The CIE project involved researching policies and procedures that encourage cleantech incubation. Through facilitating the exchange of best practice, policy development and experiences with policy makers and cleantech incubator authorities, the CIE project has developed a list of suggested policy interventions to benefit entrepreneurs working in this sector.
The project has enabled complementary policies to be established to provide a positive business climate and will help authorities to choose suitable policy interventions tailored to their own local and regional situation.
During the project, the CIE team organised seminars in each partner region bringing together key stakeholders such as local policy makers, research institutions and cleantech incubators. We shared local best practice and visited successful business incubators, cleantech pilots and live demonstrators.
In the handbook designed for policymakers, titled ‘Cleantech Incubation; Policy and Practice’ we have showcased the best practice gained from all 13 cleantech incubators analysed during the project.
The project was delivered in partnership with representatives from:
- The Netherlands (City of Delft; Delft University of Technology, lead partner),
- Finland (City of Helsinki, Green Net Finland),
- Hungary (Szent Istvan University),
- UK (Peterborough City Council, Opportunity Peterborough),
- France (ParisTech, Essone region, Novagreen) and;
- Italy (I3P and Municipality of Turin).