Conclusion of the Euromed Programme

The Euromed Cluster Excellence training successfully concludes its programme with a final week in Brussels

The Euromed Cluster Excellence teams completed the Train-the-Trainers programme during their 6th training week taking place in Brussels, on the 13th and 14th of May 2014.

The changes that have taken place in the Southern Mediterranean region have no precedence in the recent history. It’s a time of both challenges and opportunities for a whole new generation. The Euromed Programme - "Innovative Entrepreneurs for Change " - was spurred by the European Commission on behest of the European Parliament. The programme was devised to bring support to the local economic forces in these times of democratic transition, by developing expertise and training practitioners in the areas of Cluster Management and Innovation Management. A way to actively support local entrepreneurs and innovators.

The programme which started in April 2013 was designed for Tunisia, Morocco, Lebanon and Egypt. Previous training weeks took place in Beirut, Casablanca, Tunis and Barcelona.

After days of sustained interaction between professors and participants, teams were awarded the Certification for their participation in the programme. Diplomas were delivered by Reza Zadeh, Executive Director of the Foundation, and Dr. Nikos Pantalos, Policy Officer for Clusters and Emerging Industries at the European Commission, DG Enterprise.

Classes of the week were taught by renowned European cluster experts and practitioners from Spain, Denmark and France. They provided the participants with an in-depth view on the topics of continuous cluster policy input and cluster policy evaluation.

On completion of their practical field-projects, participants will qualify as Cluster Management Excellence trainers and will be able to run training courses for economic development professionals, using the European Cluster Excellence methodology and material. The participants left Brussels with the firm intention to disseminate the methodology in their respective countries, hoping to foster regional competitiveness and social well-being through Cluster Excellence.

A unique opportunity to ignite positive socio-economic changes across the Euromed region.

CIP Call 2013/2014 - 1st Training Week

The latest training programme on Cluster Excellence Management has started

The first week of the new Train-the-Trainers programme started last Monday in Barcelona in support of the European Commission's CIP Call 2013: "Towards World-Class Clusters, Promoting Cluster Excellence".

42 participants from across Europe completed the first intensive week of a nine-month training programme in Cluster Excellence Management. 

During the week participants, representing 15 regions in 10 countries, were introduced to the concept of Cluster Excellence Management and its methodology. They were given to examine cases studies from European regions as well as from other international business communities. The programme, which combines 6 weeks of in-class training with a hands-on, practical experience in developing a regional Cluster Initiative, was developed under the European Cluster Excellence Initiative (ECEI) with co-funding from the European Commission.

On successful completion of the training in February 2015, participants will qualify as Associate Trainers. This will enable them to run Cluster Management training courses in their regions, using the Cluster Excellence methodology and material, while receiving support from the Foundation throughout the process.

Most participants from the previous programme (CIP Call 2011), successfully embarked cluster agents of their respective regions onto Cluster Management Excellence trainings. 

European Commission launches the Cluster Excellence Programme

The Cluster Excellence Programme launched by the European Commission supports the Foundation's Cluster Excellence Management training 

The Call for Proposals is open until October 29th, 2014.

The overall objective of this Call for Proposals is to pursue European efforts in strengthening Cluster Excellence Management. The aim is to provide more professional business services to European SMEs through clusters, and therefore contribute to the development of more world-class clusters across the EU.

This Call for Proposals is the first action in the framework of the Cluster Excellence Programme to be supported under COSME, and is aimed at promoting cluster excellence across the EU for the benefit of European SMEs involved in clusters. The present action will assist cluster organizations, business networks and their managers in providing high quality services to SMEs in different areas, including access to foreign markets.

The European Foundation for Cluster Excellence's various training programmes were particularly designed to address the requirements of this call. The interested cluster organizations and business networks should be engaged in strategic, industry-driven collaboration (or should be planning to work together) along a common value chain, or in a transnational project in any manufacturing or service sector. They should be facing common economic challenges and should be willing to:

• Improve their management practices as well as their market/competitive advances or value-chain analytical capacities.
• Provide top-quality services to their SMEs.  Especially that of integrating creativity into their business, facilitating SMEs internationalization, better exploiting and diffusing Key Enabling Technologies (KETs), assisting SMEs on IPRs protection and further addressing resource-efficiency issues with their cluster.

Eligible costs include: participation in the trainings for a maximum of two persons from each project partner, including their travel costs.

For further details please visit the European Commission's page featuring full description of the Cluster Excellence Programme.