ImpAct Agencies intends to reshape and make more efficient, through the Twinning Advanced methodology, a set of services to support BICs and incubators. Through an open social innovation model, the project will allow BICs and incubators to support social impact SMEs and entrepreneurs to achieve a better impact and play an active role within the local social innovation ecosystem. By matching and integrating social entrepreneurship support programmes, policy strategies and online tools, ImpAct Agencies aims to design a modular kit of tools and services for accompanying entrepreneurs in improving their social impact. The consortium is composed by four Innovation Agencies: ART-ER (Italy) - the project coordinator, Fundecyt-Pctex (Spain), WestBIC (Ireland) and IFKA (Hungary). All of them already work on the topic of social innovation and social entrepreneurship in different ways: shaping policy instruments, developing specific networks and projects or supporting and implementing policy strategies at local level. This twinning advanced action has a multiple goal, since it will support partners in: - carry on a peer review and assessment on their respective service through an active stakeholder engagement activity; - reshape and combine those services linked to open social innovation model; - design a new service package for BICs and incubators dealing with social innovation ecosystems; - set up permanent relations within the partnership with the aim of improving each partners’ services and - build an interregional community of social innovation agencies. The final output of the project is the drafting of a complete Design Option Paper, dedicated to analyse and describe all different scenarios in terms of background, framework conditions and organizations, process and service delivery system and stage of development. This will allow to transfer and mainstream the service delivery system to different EU contexts and agencies.

POWDERBLADE aims to gain market acceptance and rapid market take up of an innovative materials technology involving carbon/glass fibres in powder epoxy to be commercialised initially in the production of larger wind turbine blades (60 metre +). The immediate impact of this disruptive materials technology in the wind energy sector will be reduced wind turbine cost (-20%). This in turn will lead to increased productivity of low-carbon energy from more rapid market deployment of large turbines. The reduction in costs and increase in productivity will reduce the Levelised Cost of Electricity (LCOE) for the European citizen – the ultimate beneficiary of this innovation. This ambitious project is led by Éire Composites, an established industry player in composites manufacturing for the Aerospace and Renewable sectors and an experienced FP7/Horizon 2020 participant.In the year after project end, ÉireComposites will generate over €7m in revenue from direct sales of larger blade components using the new materials, increasing to €39m by 2021. The longer term commercial strategy is to focus on recurring revenues from the supply of advanced materials directly to manufacturers to produce blades and other products under license. This revenue stream will generate €60m by 2021. ÉireComposites will employ an additional 78 staff in direct production at project end increasing to 489 employees over both revenue streams three years later. Suzlon, a large wind OEM and end user, is the second industry partner. Their involvement demonstrates early market acceptance of the new technology. Suzlon are committed to investing substantial funds in the commercialisation of this technology in return for the opportunity to gain significantly as the first large industry player to market with light, cost-effective carbon-glass hybrid blades. Technology partner (University of Edinburgh) and innovation specialists (WestBIC) will support the industry partners in achieving the goals of POWDERBLADE.

"The BIC for SME project builds on the previously completed project, the POWER2INNO (Horizon 2020, 2016-2017), which included peer learning activities between three innovation agencies, directed to raising their competences for empowerment of small and micro companies’ for innovative entrepreneurship. The POWER2INNO project produced knowledge on building a regional system for enhancement of innovation with small and micro companies, one of the key elements being training and education for entrepreneurs. However, the limitations of the POWER2INNO project prevented the partners from preparing concrete usable learning tools for such education. The Erasmus+ programme provided a perfect opportunity to address this. The main objective of the BIC for SME project was to upgrade the POWER2INNO project results by providing concrete tools for the education and training of entrepreneurs for innovative entrepreneurship, training of educational staff of the participating organizations and pilot training for selected individual entrepreneurs. All of these were delivered and in this way, the BIC for SME project contributes to quality improvements of C-VET programs in the area of innovation and entrepreneurship, to innovation excellence of small and micro entrepreneurs as well as to internationalization at the level of participating organizations, through enhanced transnational cooperation between different training providers. Thus, the project: • Contributes to improving the quality and access to vocational education and training in the area of small and micro innovation entrepreneurship; • Contributes to improving knowledge and skills of employees in relevant consulting and training organizations; • Contributes to improving the employability and professional success of learners interested in this subject. Points which were validated from feedback of participants during piloting and dissemination events.BIC for SME has helped to reduce the gap between market demand (people seeking training for small and micro entrepreneurship) and training system supply, which is currently predominantly oriented towards small and middle-sized enterprises / entrepreneurship. This has been addressed as follows: • Development of training program for ""BIC for SME"" for trainers; • Development of training program for small and micro entrepreneurs interested in boosting their innovation activity; • Development of relevant learning materials. The project included five competent partners from five different countries: lead by the WESTBIC, an innovation agency from Ireland, there are also the RDA Green Karst, Centre for Innovation and Development from Slovenia, BIC Euronova from Spain, Tecnopolis technology park from Italy and the EFMD international network which operates actively in the area of training and education in a wide area of EU and beyond. All partners have experience in Erasmus+ as well as other EU-supported programs, such as transnational programs, HORIZON 2020, COSME, FP7 etc., and this experience was vital in helping to guide the BIC for SME project through the challenges posed by Covid 19. All partners are also experienced in entrepreneurial training and other services. They participate in several professional networks and have the potential to ensure the widespread use of the project's result, in accordance with the dissemination plan which was also developed during the project, along with other management and coordination tools, through which successful and quality implementation took place.Some key outcomes to note (and which will be further addressed post project completion) are:BIC Euronova signed an agreement with Fundación Andalucía Emprende (a public regional institution dealing with entrepreneurs and start-ups in the Andalucía region (8 million inhabitants), comprising almost 1000 consultants / mentors, 263 centres, and almost 15,000 entrepreneurs / start-ups), to collaborated on testing of training material and to adapting the BIC for SME tools and materials as a standard for their daily work.In Ireland, WestBIC are to have follow up discussions with Dr. Brían Ó Donnchadha, at the Centre for Adult Learning and Professional Development, on the possible use of the BIC for SME outputs while follow-up discussion is also to happen with GMIT Letterfrack on possible use of the outputs as part of the Enterprise Development module on the Furniture Design and Furniture and Wood Technology programmes. Galway Technology Centre will also consider the Diagnostic Tool as a client management tool.Beyond a European context, EFMD will use the modules in short online trainings called Cápsulas de gestion. The trainings cover various aspects of management aiming to develop entrepreneurship, innovation and creativity in Cuban universities accompanying the modernisation of the Cuban economy. This will act as a model for EFMD to implement a similar format of the programme in other European countries."

Europe’s economic growth and jobs depend on its ability to support the growth of enterprises. Entrepreneurship favours new companies, opens up new markets, and nurtures new skills. The most important sources of employment in the EU are the Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs). The EU objective is to encourage people to become entrepreneurs and also make it easier for them to set up and grow their businesses. Education for entrepreneurship can make a difference as young people who go through entrepreneurial programmes and activities start more companies and earlier.The main objective of the GET UP project is to provide a learning tool to promote entrepreneurship for youth by using new information and communication technologies (ICT), empowering participants with the knowledge and mechanisms to design their proper business models. The innovative aspect of this project is the Geomarketing supported on concepts of Location Intelligence that enables finding the best geographic location based on the intersection spatial data and several variable factors supported by a set of techniques for analysing the economic and social reality from the geographical standpoint, which includes mapping and spatial analysis tools on a cloud-based mapping platform, directing the needs of the entrepreneur for the location with higher potential of success and allowing to attract investment to different and deprive regions in the partner countries. Finally a business plan design is envisaged to be developed during the training course, including the definition of the product and of the financial, material and human resources, which are a great tool to support young entrepreneurs. The partnership is composed by 6 organisations from Italy/LUISS University, Portugal/AidLearn and ESRI, Greece/AUTH University, Spain/University of Salamanca and Ireland/WestBIC. The partners were chosen firstly based on their expertise facing the main objectives defined for the project and taking into account the desirable interaction between research and business fields; and secondly the majority of them presents a high experience in previous EU projects, which also enrich the partnership. Finally, the partners were chosen taking into account the youth unemployment rates present in their countries, the implementation of the GET UP project is an added value to the relevant economic and social needs of the partner countries. The main goal of the GET UP project is to increase awareness of the end-users, youth under 25s, unemployed with secondary school or higher education diploma and young secondary or graduate people seeking first job, on how to become an entrepreneur using the Geomarketing and location intelligence concepts to achieve their objectives and implement their business ideas. The GET UP project is structured in 3 Outputs: O1: Research on Entrepreneurship: a detailed research on Entrepreneurship able to a deeper understanding on what is an entrepreneur according to EU politics and the national requirements to create a company. O2: Research on Geomarketing: a detailed research on Geomarketing and Location Intelligence to know concepts, their application on business decisions and data to be used. O3: GET UP Learning Platform: an advanced Learning Platform with updated, high quality, easy and attractive contents. The GET UP project results are: - Research on Entrepreneurship - Research on Geomarketing - GET UP Learning Package - GET UP Learning Platform The GET UP Learning Platform, which combines the GET UP courses, an online Geographic Information System (GIS) and the Open Spatial Data Set, enables further assistance to the end-users to understand the importance of combining geographic data with business and market data in order to gain critical insights, make better-informed decisions, design processes and enhance operational efficiency. The GET UP Learning Platform is a useful tool to promote self-employment and also restore the confidence of unemployed youth through taking full advantage of the resources available in their countries, knowing the business community, market trends and getting knowledge about the territory where they live and segmenting it, in order to isolate the best places to put their business ideas into practice. GET UP main goal is to allow and support a concrete implementation of innovative businesses, enabling participants to become effectively entrepreneurs, spreading the concept of Entrepreneurship and Geomarketing as an essential core to make business, also to other potential entrepreneurs. The GET UP project is an excellent opportunity to reinforce the economic growth, helping to rebuild the economies of partners countries and reaching potentially 1,4 million of unemployed youth (under 25s) in partners countries (actually 36% of youth are unemployed in EU28), maximizing also the most creative human capital of those countries.

Large parts of the European territory are rural areas and there is still about 30% of the continent’s population living in these locations. Rural areas in particular in remote locations still face diverse economic and demographic challenges. Ageing and migration are serious concerns leading to deterioration in the operational environment of the business community. Labour shortages (quantitative and qualitative) may deter investment. New local-based businesses, promoted by young adult unemployed, preferably women, who take advantage of the heritage of ancestral and traditional activities, adding marketing innovation and the use of new technologies could be potential solutions in some cases for the problem of a shortage of appropriate local job opportunities. As such, INSIDE-T is looking to promote intergenerational learning and the development of professional skills in young adult and women unemployed, to social sustainability in tourism in low density territories (rural areas). Aligned with this, INSIDE-T wants to make a breach into the negative social and economic beliefs on the future of low density territories.Project’s specific objectives are:1.Promote a blended training package, addressing challenges young adult unemployed face in transforming their situation in small sustainable business models, towards social sustainability in low density territories;2. Create interactive tools, reconnecting and engaging generations through the connection of young adults unemployed to seniors in low density territories in Europe;3. Provide unemployed people with an intergenerational interactive learning platform containing all training material;4. Deliver guidelines for the use of Inside-T pack for VET providers.The project is composed by interlinked activities resulting in the production of a pack with resources and methodologies adapted to the targets to be used by VET providers, social animators and tourism organisations, proposing a new multilevel and engaged learning process, mediated by real testimonies and life stories and narratives of those who made it possible (Multimedia Best Practices), who have successful companies in low density territories.INSIDE-T promotes the use of life cycle metrology, which implies a sequence of activities for planning, executing and dissemination the project results. During the project lifetime, the following intellectual outputs will be developed:O1- INSIDE-T CurriculumO2- Multimedia Best PracticesO3- INSIDE T Course and learning manualO4- INSIDE-T e-Tools (self-assessment tool, collaborative resource network and a creative lab)O5- Inside-T e-learning paltaformO6- Guidelines for VET providersFinally, the project is intended for VET providers and trainers, animators, and social educators that will embrace a final target facing the greatest difficulties in finding employment, with priority being given to young adult people, mainly women, graduates or not, with or without training, but without employment, women job seekers, job seekers from urban areas that want to try news life experiences in rural areas and job seekers in rural areas.The potential stakeholders of the project will be Vocational Training Centers, Schools, Universities, Companies, Community Centers, Social and collective Associations, Professional Associations, Tourist Routes, Tourism Schools, Local Development Associations, Regional and local authorities and Local Creative Industries. All these players will be involved in the project activities and events, not only by testing the intellectual outputs, but also acting as multiplier agents during the lifetime of the project.By achieving its aim, the INSIDE-T project will be a huge step towards a more ambitious of fostering entrepreneurial mindset, innovation and business creation, by acting on improving the economic situation of unemployed. Creating their own job opportunities, based on traditional occupations/crafts at risk of disappearing, cultural heritages, authentic rural activities through intergenerational learning, these targets will assure a more positive individual situation as such a more sustainable rural areas.