What is SME Cluster Growth?
SME Cluster Growth are an ERASMUS+ Knowledge Alliance project to empower SMEs in the engineering sector to grow and compete. The project team is led by the University of Málaga, Spain and spans nine partners across seven European countries.
It is an ambitious collaboration with higher education institutions (HEIs), future skills and business growth professionals and university-industry relationship experts to advance engineering SMEs’ capacities.
SME Cluster Growth Team
Mission of the project
Supporting SMEs in the engineering sector to innovate and grow
Engineering remains a dominant knowledge sector in the EU. By focusing on cross-border engineering business cluster development, we enable synergies across regions, reach international markets, adopt new technologies, and support mutual learning.
Engineering SMEs and the Higher Education community will be the primary beneficiaries of this approach. While students, regional government, intermediary organisations, venture capitalists, business consultants and investors will also have the advantage of an outward looking engineering ecosystem.
Who will benefit of the project?
Engineering SMEs interested in using a cluster growth approach, tapping into new resources and building new strategic partnerships to increase their opportunities and innovation capacity.
Higher Education Institutions that want to create new ways to collaborate and gain access to a reliable set of resources to improve their teaching practices and expand their offerings to student entrepreneurs.
Intermediary Bodies e.g., Government organisations, students, business consultants who want a better understanding of the business ecosystem to develop solutions for real world problems.
How does the project create impact?
Through five support areas or key deliverables:
- Mapping & Spotlight on engineering cluster growth need
- Cluster Growth Councils
- Learning
- Consultancy
- Facilities Sharing
Development of Cluster growth councils
Six Engineering Cluster Growth Councils, based in consortium cities and surrounding regions (Malaga, Alcalá de Henares, Bologna, Cork, Istanbul, and Paris), will each develop a collaboration network and culture for joint innovation in their partner regions. They will work to 4 key success factors:
- Increase interactions between Engineering SMEs and universities.
- Multiply interactions between different clusters.
- Determine the precise success factors to be adapted with the challenges specific to each cluster.
- Create a direct impact in each country.