Infusse Pedagogical Scenarios
dIgital eNtrepreneurial skills For UniverSity Education (INFUSSE) has started working on the development of a 100% Virtual Learning programme on “Digital Entrepreneurship” for students and graduates to stimulate innovative learning and teaching practices and support digital capabilities of the Higher Education Institutes (HEIs).
The partnership composed of 6 organizations, private and public, belonging to 3 EU countries Greece, Romania and Poland (3 HEIs and 3 innovation support counterparts), investigated the characteristics of incubation/acceleration programmes and initiatives, identified the key INFUSSE stakeholders and their needs to create a common understanding for the development of the INFUSSE incubator approach.
Starting with studying the current status of the innovation and digital entrepreneurship landscape of Greece, Romania and Poland, INFUSSE partners noted that the level of digital technology integration and digital skills is low for those countries in comparison to other EU countries. Even though, digitalization and digital technologies are important for the evolution of key sectors supporting the three economies and the countries have undertook actions to boost these. Among them, the digital entrepreneurship through education is getting noticed as a way to make the future entrepreneurs keeping up with the new digital era. Thus, many HEIs have launched incubation/acceleration initiatives to infuse students and graduates with entrepreneurial spirit and useful skills for the future. Key findings for the three countries are presented in the table below:
To achieve this a work program has been defined, dividing all tasks to be carried out into 4 work packages to reach the results of the project. INFUSSE will produce 9 Project Results (PRs) in which all partners participate.
Leadership of the tasks and responsibilities assigned were based on the competencies and experience of the partners.
| Greece | Romania | Poland |
Population | 10.72 million people | 19.11 million people | 38,09 million people |
Area | 131.960 km2 | 230,080 km2 | 312,696 km2 |
GDP per capita | 17.622 EUR | 11,430 EUR | 13,934 EUR |
Unemployment rate | 16.3 % | 4.8% | 2,9% |
Global Competitiveness Index | 87 out of 137 | 68 out of 137 | 39 out of 137 |
Type of Innovator | Moderate Innovator | Emerging Innovator | Emerging Innovator |
Digital Economy and Society Index | 25th out of 27 EU Member States | 27th out of 27 EU Member States | 24th out of 27 EU Member States |
Total early-stage Entrepreneurial Activity[1] | 43 out of 47 | 28 out of 47 | 47 out of 47 |
National Entrepreneurship Context Index | 4.4 | 4.0 | 4.2 |
The partnership also focused the efforts to the stakeholders of the entrepreneurship ecosystem of the three countries, which includes many 4-helix actors such as Universities, Startups, Science Parks & Technology Transfer, Innovation Clusters, VCs, Incubators, Accelerators, Co-working spaces, and Federations. The Romanian start-ups represent 99.7% of the total enterprise share. In Greece there are over 70 active incubators, accelerators, and technology centers and over 1.500 start-ups registered and in Poland the academic business incubators is the biggest network of incubators in Poland with over 50 incubators located in 24 cities. INFUSSE Partnership identified 95 relevant stakeholders belonging in the following categories: Accelerator/ Incubator, Business Angel, Investors, EIT Innovation Hub, Technology Park, Innovation Hub, Cluster/Network/Chamber, HEIs, LLC and NGOs who will support and capitalize the INFUSSE approach that support the development of the entrepreneurship ecosystem via offering services and other amenities.
A total of 60 incubation/acceleration initiatives and programmes offered from the identified stakeholders or from other organizations in Greece, Romania and Poland (20 per country), characterized by various digital readiness levels as well as from a variety of learning environments (HEIs, VETs, public and private incubators,networks etc), were identified and analyzed by the partners. The 60 cases evaluated by the Partnership to conclude to the 20 most suitable for the development of INFUSSE approach
Half of them are operating in a hybrid format, their duration is over 4 months and have an horizontal sectorial focus. They provide a plethora of services such as training services and workshops, matchmaking, networking, funding opportunities, working space, site visits, etc. and the educational materials are mostly focusing on the whole process for the development of a business from the ideation to the actual commercialization and expansion. The top 20 incubation/acceleration organizations are: StepFwd (RO), Warsaw University of Technology (PL), Start-up Spark (by Łodz Economic Zone) (PL), Mindspace University (GR), egg (GR), i4G (GR), Space3ac (PL), National
Bank of Greece (GR), CISCO (GR), Invent ICT (GR), Techcelerator (RO), OK!Thess (GR), Google Polska (PL), CAPSULE T (GR), Spherik Accelerator (RO), SWPS University (PL), FOUND.ATION (GR), ALBA Hub for Entrepreneurship and Odyssea (GR), CUPA (RO), Leon Kozminski Academy (PL)
Coming to the most important activity for forming the INFUSSE incubator, the challenges and needs & expectations in terms of digital entrepreneurship and incubation programmes for three types of stakeholders were identified through simi-structured interviews and questionnaires: