Final event of Better Incubation project

Last Friday the final event of the Better Incubation project was held with great success!

The event started in the morning with an EU Policy Workshop aimed at sharing and validating Better Incubation Policy Recommendations with policymakers, researchers, BSOs, investors for impact, regional development agencies, national agencies for social innovation and pan-European networks like Eurocities and Euclid. An interactive workshop where 25+ participants were asked to discuss the 6 issues identified by the project as the ones the eentrepreneurial ecosystem(s) in Europe need to consider and address to boost European social and inclusive entrepreneurship.

In the afternoon Mrs Brigitte Fellahi-Brugneau, Head of Unit at DG Employment, shared some reflections on how Better Incubation contributed to promote and support social and inclusive entrepreneurship in Europe, by leveraging the knowledge, the competencies, the networks of mainstream business support organisations.

Then the partners of the project, Directors and Managers representing EVPA, IHUB and EBN shared some insights on the relevance of the Better Incubation programme for their communities, agreeing that the project offered a unique opportunity to grow knowledge, tools and methodologies for BSOs and investors. Moreover, Better Incubation enabled the three networks to involve their members and let them cooperate directly, this leading to new partnerships, opportunities and wider impact.

Better Incubation, a Network of Networks, achieved so many important results over a relatively short period of 2 years, where more than 133 entrepreneurs and would-be entrepreneurs from URGs received incubation programmes from 21 organisations in 14 European countries. EBN, IHUB and EVPA, with the support and advice of Caritas Europa, ENSIE, EMES, Cooperatives Europe, managed to mobilise the European entrepreneurial ecosystem thanks to the active engagement of their members (EU|BICs, Impact Hubs and invesotrs for impact) who took this opportunity to rethink their programmes, their organisations and their ecosystems in a more inclusive and impact-driven way

Chiara Davalli, Senior Project Leader & Project Manager of Better Incubation, EBN

The event continued with the VOICES of Better Incubation telling the stories of EU|BICs, Impact Hubs, Investors for Impact and other stakeholders involved in the project activities. Regional policy workshops’ organisers, inclusive incubation programmes managers, CoPs experts and facilitators, trainings and networking events’ participants, investors mentoring winners of the Better Incubation Contest, Scaling Impact. These the perspectives represented in this crowded and emotional panel, a conversation that showed how Better Incubation successfully managed to kick-start an ecosystemic change in the incubation ecosystem.

In the end, the winners of the Better Incubation Contest were on stage to share how the Better Incubation project’s scaling program is helping them understand and move the first steps into new markets in Europe.

Interested to check out the final event? You can see the recording of the event bellow: