Regional Strategies & Innovation (RSI-) Group at Steinbeis-Europa-Zentrum (SEZ)

SEZ, located in Stuttgart, is one of the 700+ Steinbeis organisations in the network of the Baden-Württemberg-based Steinbeis-Foundation for Economic Promotion. SEZ was established in 1990 as the operational unit of the Commissioner for European Affairs of the Minister of Economics in Baden-Württemberg (BW), and since then has expanded its activities portfolio. With its budget coming primarily from public funds (EU, national, regional), SEZ actively promotes all types of RTDI-related international cooperation and innovation activities supporting the different actors in the globally linked innovation system of BW.

SEZ's activities aim at fostering European competitiveness by strengthening the technology and innovation base of all of these innovation systems actors, with a particular focus on SMEs. Specifically, SEZ is involved in:

• linking the regional and the EU level making use of its profound knowledge of organisations, key players and processes at both levels;

• fostering regional and business innovation through the integration of tailored prospective and strategic elements (economic & policy intelligence);

•  promoting SMEs’ and Universities’ involvement in European RTD projects and transnational technology transfer, and linking key regional players by setting up European initiatives.

For the European Commission, SEZ is a leading BW partner in the Enterprise Europe Network (formerly Innovation Relay Centre Network). SEZ is also active in the Innovating Regions in Europe (IRE) network and in other networks of European and regional interest. Since 2001, SEZ acts on behalf of the Federal Ministry of Economics and Technology as the National Contact Point for SMEs in BW stimulating SME participation in the European Commission's Framework Programme for Research and Development.

The SEZ RSI-group supports public and private actors in the fields of business and policy development to design and implement tailored, forward-looking strategic approaches to boost competitiveness and innovation in the medium- and long-term.

Main task in the Project CReATE

The role of the SEZ's RSI-Group in the CReATE project is to produce a state-of-the-art paper on advanced cluster development, to create the methodological framework for the project's cluster analyses, to design the strategy processes in the regions and support their implementation, to assist with the development of the research agenda, to carry out training, capacity-building and dissemination measures, and to advise the partners on all strategic issues.

SEZ is leader on the work package covering the background Information and Framework for Regional Analysis

For more information: http://www.steinbeis-europa.de/340.html

<< Back to: CReATE Partners