EEN Innovation Support Services for SMEs in North West Italy

Project Information

ALPS INN3

Grant agreement ID: 879956

DOI

10.3030/879956

Project closed

EC signature date 3 December 2019

Start date 1 January 2020

End date 31 December 2021

Funded under

• INDUSTRIAL LEADERSHIP - Innovation In SMEs

Total cost

€ 267 912,50

EU contribution

€ 267 912,00

Coordinated by

CAMERA DI COMMERCIO INDUSTRIA ARTIGIANATO AGRICOLTURA DI TORINO
Italy

Periodic Reporting for period 1 - ALPS INN3 (EEN Innovation Support Services for SMEs in North West Italy)

Reporting period: 2020-01-01 to 2021-12-31

Summary of the context and overall objectives of the project

The project, whose geographical coverage is North-West Italy (3 regions : Piemonte Liguria and Valle d’Aosta) aimed at fostering overall SMEs competitiveness by delivering 86 service packages (indicatively 10 KAM services and 76 EIMC services) to companies with international growth potential via product, process service and or business model innovation presenting gaps regarding innovation management and to SME Instrument/EIC Accelerator/FTI/FET Open Beneficiaries.
The objectives of the action are summarised below:
1. to foster SMEs international growth and innovation outreach
2. to foster SMEs Innovation capacity enhancement and innovation projects implementation, job creation and new market access
3. to facilitate SMEs Innovation results exploitation and innovation spill over enhancement at local level
4. to achieve a deep understanding of local business innovation support needs: mapping and understanding the context within which the service is placed
6. to increase EEN specific service positioning within the regional innovation ecosystem
7. to help advisory skill enhancement: ALPS EEN personnel, assisting the experts in this Action, will increase expertise and competences, providing high level advisory on innovation management
8. to finetune a EU shared support methodology for EEN staff, which could be adopted for profitably supporting other local SMEs

EEN innovation support services have been segmented, as in the past years, into three tiers, from baseline awareness activities to in-depth assessments aimed at leveraging SMEs strenghts and weaknesses. Tier 1 and Tier 2 have been implemented by EEN COSME services: from awareness raising to tailored innovation specialised services for international R&D and technology cooperation and project funding; Tier 3 services (related to ALPS INN3 project) have been implemented for companies with high potential for innovation and internationalisation, they have become in the years an entry point within the present action with the objective of coming back to tier 2 services with a greater knowledge of real SMEs needs, thus enhancing their growth on one side, achieving on the other side a major EEN impact.
The core report effectively shows how this approach has been winning in terms of generated results.

Work performed from the beginning of the project to the end of the period covered by the report and main results achieved so far

The services proposed were based on EEN shared guidelines, manuals, trainings as well as participation in consortium, national an EU Working Groups.
The basic principles of the action were to empower SMEs in their efforts towards successful implementation and subsequent commercialisation of their innovation. Thus a combination of EEN soft skills, common assessment tools (namely IMP3ROVE), together with Coaching schemes funded by EU, ensured targeted SMEs to achieve significant results and impact.
The staff involved in the action was mainly composed of experienced senior advisors with a long experience providing assessments and action plans that had the capacity to adapt to the peculiarities faced by each SME as a consequence of COVID-19 emergency.
Despite the rising of the pandemics early in 2020 and the lack of new EIC Accelerator cases to be coached, ALPS INN3 consortium was in fact able to reinvent its role providing a set of customised compliant assessments to be offered based on each SME situation.
The emergency led to the rise of new services related to sustainability and digitalisation that have become the basis for the new network from 2022 on.
The consortium was then able to deliver 72 EIMC service packages and to close 6 KAM cases (plus an old phase 2 case for which an additional coaching service was provided).
Out of 79 total cases in 2020-2021 impact was generated for 9 companies (including some clients assessed in previous periods) and a potential impact is shown for another 15 cases.

Progress beyond the state of the art and expected potential impact (including the socio-economic impact and the wider societal implications of the project so far)

The impact measured on clients might be summarised as follows:
• international growth and partnership fine tuning;
• innovation capacity and awareness on economic performance related to innovation enhancement;
• profitably supporting local SMEs access to well identified Coach/EEN experts community at EU level;
• access to finance (Venture capital funds, H2020-HEUROPE funds, cascading grants, prizes and national funds);
• access to international markets;
• access to sustainability best practices;
Assessed clients have become fidelised companies trusting EEN services.
These services and this approach have now been embedded in EEN overall project and will be offered from 2022 on as entry point for the client journey. The high success rate in terms of reached achievements shows how a deep knowledge of SMEs peculiarities can lead to a winning customised approach based on SMEs effective needs and to the creation of an ecosystem of high impact clients SMEs with international ambition and growth potential.