Project

According to the European Commission, bioeconomy has a great contribution potential in relation to the challenges identified by the Green deals and by 2035, the bioeconomy-based industry can generate about 400,000 new green jobs in Europe, some of which in rural areas. BioeconomyVentures aims at facilitating and fostering the way to realize such an ambitious target by eliminating some of the identified obstacles. Start-ups and spin-off companies are usually associated with highly innovative ideas and potential. However, that is not mirrored by their performances on the market. About 90% of start-ups and spin-off companies, in fact, fail within three years from their creation, 10% of which within the first year. Behind this high failure rate there are many responsible factors that we can trace back to three main reasons:

  • They prove to be unable to raise the necessary funds;

  • The founding members are not expert and lack of the proper management capacity;

  • The mentoring and supporting initiatives in the sector are fragmented and not interconnected.

As a matter of fact, mentored initiatives have recorded a three times faster growth and they managed to raise seven times more finances than their not-supported counterparts, as stated by Forbes.

BioeconomyVentures aims at creating an entrepreneurial ecosystem within the bio-based industry sector by offering support, brokerage and networking services to the relevant stakeholders.

BioeconomyVentures consortium, building on this context, within a 30 months period, plans to set up a framework able to ignite the necessary interaction and collaboration within start-ups/spin-offs, investors and the community, and provide holistic support to the emerging bio-based industry ecosystem. BioeconomyVentures will target with specific actions both sides of the community: investors and start-ups/spin-offs.
Within the scope of the project the partners will elaborate an advanced methodology to efficiently identify and evaluate the needs of the new companies and a platform where all the services needed by the community are provided.

The project’s geographical reach will be expanded thanks to the Ambassador Programme, that, after a careful selection process, will involve about 20 other clusters, accelerators, and intermediary organizations. They will contribute to expand the resonance of BioeconomyVentures within Europe, reaching also local communities and policy-makers.