Restructuring Globalisation Through Cross-Country Collaboration

This study focuses on how Science and Technology Parks and Areas of Innovation (STP/AOI) can attract SMEs to solve international challenges through cross-country collaboration. In doing so, 11 STPs/AOIs from nine European countries designed the Urban Tech project, aiming to develop solutions for the urban environment, focusing on Health Tech, Greentech and Smart Cities. In Urban Tech’s four phases, exploration, ideation, implementation, commercialisation, the most promising SMEs are stepwise awarded to develop international businesses. This paper reports the first two phases. In cross-country collaboration between the STPs/AOIs, methods for collecting challenges, open call and hackathons were developed. Over 300 challenges from 12 countries were collected and SMEs from 36 countries generated 559 solutions for 35 business-sectors. At eight international hackathons, 228 demonstration solutions were developed. Of these, 80 SMEs (37 cross-border SMEs) were awarded for the following phases, implementation and commercialisation. For inspiration, in-depth details of the process are provided.