The role of industrial ecosystems discussed at the Open Innovation Conference 2.0 (13−14 June, Cluj-Napoca, Romania)

Submitted by Lucia Seel on 29 June 2017

OI2.0 Conference Founder and Adviser for Innovation Systems at the European Commission, Directorate General for Communications, Network, content, and Technology (DG CONNECT) Bror Salmelin about the event: “Cluj-Napoca has outperformed our expectations and set a new standard for the upcoming OI2.0 Conference editions. The impressive performance of Open Innovation 2.0 Conference and its related events in Cluj-Napoca propels the co-creation of innovation ecosystems across Europe.

Open Innovation 2.0 2017 events series drew to a close on the 14th of June in Cluj-Napoca after five action-intense days. More than 500 guests from 20 countries attended the open innovation 2.0 workshops and seminars, conducted by 70 speakers under the lead theme of “digital innovation” – a new record in terms of participation and national diversity.

From left to right: Martin Curley (OISPG/IVI/Mastercard), Bror Salmelin (DG CONNECT, European Commission), Emil Boc (Mayor of Cluj-Napoca), Bianca Muntean (ARIES Transilvania, iTech Transilvania Cluster)

This year’s global span on the cooperation for innovation across the entire Europe and reaching out to Japan had a major impact from the beginning. What set apart Open Innovation 2.0 Conference in Cluj-Napoca, was the fact that the organizers entangled a series of events starting with the city’s first Innovation Dialogue on June 10th and 11th, followed by the Clusters Matchmaking on June 12th (that had a dedicated session to Korean-Romanian cooperation), the first Town Hall Debate chaired by the Committee of Regions on June 13th, the 2-days OI2 Conference itself and the Innovation Luminary Awards, in the evening of June 13th.

“The conference’s approach embraces multiple aspects of the society and the transformative power of digitalization. The talks and related debates triggered the participants to contribute and come up with solutions,” remarked Mr. Salmelin, adding: “The twelve publicly presented Conference Conclusions propel OI2 as the platform for digital innovation, they encourage the OISPG community to trial and give feedback, while the mechanism of the Industry Commons OI2 enables safely building disruptive innovation on top of existing industry capabilities. We noted also that Europe is called to be active in creating open bus architecture for DLT, to extend the dialogue with Japan for managing societal change and The European Commission is suggested to tailor its support offerings based on unique characteristics of different ecosystems. The Innovation Radar should be enhanced to detect social innovations. It is also crucial that Open innovation 2.0 ecosystems as a service be created to ensure rapid experimentation and prototyping in quadruple helix settings, enabling easy and fast access to co-creation spaces geographically or thematically.”

The European Cluster Collaboration Platform (ECCP) was present at the conference, where its Content & Communication Manager, Lucia Seel made a presentation about the journey clusters made from the triple helix to an ecosystem approach and what role the ECCP plays in the open cluster community.

Cluj OI2.0 conference 13-14 June 2017

Lucia emphasized the fact that ECCP is “the network of networks”, embedding more than 600 cluster organisations from Europe and beyond and providing services for them that support international cluster collaboration. The ECCP approach is user-driven, it was designed with the support of users, a large part of the content is coming from the users themselves, and there is a quick reaction to adapt to the needs expressed by the users. In addition to facilitating the interaction between cluster organisations (both in real-life and virtually), ECCP also connects with other related platforms and brings in elements from these that are relevant for the international cluster community.

About the Open Innovation Strategy & Policy Group (OISPG):

The group supports policies for Open Innovation and works in close collaboration with the European Commission.

 (@DigitalAgendaEU). OISPG philosophy embraces the Open Innovation 2.0 paradigm: creation of open innovation ecosystems where the serendipity process is fully-fledged.

OISPG members believe that involving citizens directly in the innovation process allows rapid prototyping in real life. Building a prototype is the fastest, most effective way to push an idea forward. Prototyping will foster entrepreneurship in Europe, will create jobs and will boost sustainable economic and societal growth. Therefore, OISPG suggests various open innovation actions and approaches to industry and to other innovation partners in order to stimulate and strengthen competitiveness.

For more information contact:

Emiliya.HUBAVENSKA [at] ec.europa.eu

+32 460 754 451

Or visit:

https://ec.europa.eu/digital-single-market/en/news/open-innovation-20-conference-2017

Third Country
Japan South Korea
Share this Article