One of the focal points of NOBALIS project is to assess the HEIs’ innovation ecosystems, it strengths and weaknesses in order to decide how to proceed with improving institutional capacity. On Oct. 18 NOBALIS partners conducted a seminar to exchange of good-practice for innovation capacity building in NOBALIS and compare what their current innovation ecosystems and stakeholders look like. Each partner reviewed what kind of networking and ideation events they offer for students and staff, mapped their entrepreneurship and innovation training and courses, co-working spaces, industrial education opportunities, accelerators and incubators, funding opportunities for start-ups and spin- offs, prototyping and commercialization.
Each partner conducted a SWOT analysis. Partners have similar strengths, particularly as all HEIs have extensive partner networks and overall environmental policy and research funding priorities create opportunities for bioresource based partnership and innovation activities. Fractured communication and information dissemination within the organization was a common challenge for universities. The partner will use the innovation ecosystem mapping and SWOT as a basis for updating the IVAP and develop the roadmap for building innovation capacity in the second phase of NOBALIS project.