As the first joint follow-up action, they decided to create the EWGIC. The working group aims at elaborating synergies among consultancy companies in Europe and exploring the interest to create a European association in the medium term. By joining forces on goals of common interest, the currently fragmented landscape of consulting companies could enhance the impact of their actions at the European level. Since 24 September the working group has met twice over the phone on 14 October and 16 November. The group has progressively enlarged, and they have decided to meet once a month to ensure continuity of actions.
As second key action they released on 26 September 2019 a Manifesto to support professional project management in Horizon Europe (Read more here). This Manifesto aims to alert the EC about the proper consideration of project management for the Horizon Europe Framework Programme. Future European projects success require effective strategic management as well as professional administrative and financial management. Today 98 supporters have signed the Manifesto. As a follow-up action, a meeting with DG RTD was organised on 13 November 2019 in Brussels to promote the role of our profession and investigate ways to reduce the limit put by the Grant Agreement model to coordinators to subcontract some activities (Article 41.2 of Grant Agreement model). Further follow-up actions are being planned. Today the Manifesto reached the 100th signature.
The idea is to continue launching and following-up with more joint actions from recognised professional Innovation Consultants firms. For this, the European Working Group needs to grow and count with a large representation from the whole profession across all European countries! Should you represent a company providing services in innovation funding and would like to join the initiative we encourage you to sign the Manifesto on one side and to actively participating in the EWGIC actions by registering here.
More information on the EWGIC can be found here on the dedicated LinkedIn Page.
The participants to the EWGIC at the moment are:
• French Association of Innovation Consultants (ACI) – Luc Ragon; Emmanuelle Pianetti
• Spanish Association for the promotion of R&D (AFIDI) – Victor Cruz
• Euronovia (France) /ACI – Virginie Robin
• Fi Group (Spain, France, Portugal)/ACI, AFIDI– Alex Alvarez; Beate Kreisel; Stéphanie Albiero; Victor Cruz
• Magellan (Portugal, Belgium) – Manuela Flachi
• Navigator Consulting (Cyprus) – Philip Ammerman
• Neovia Innovation (France) /ACI – Corentin Lefèvre
• Spinverse (Finland, Germany, Sweden)– Pekka Koponen
• Syncate (Belgium) – Eswara Prasad Orupula
• Zabala Innovation Consultancy (Spain, Belgium, France, UK) /ACI, AFIDI– Marie Latour; Susana Garayoa
• Zaz Ventures (Belgium, Switzerland, UK) /ACI– Xavier Aubry
The 100 signatories of the Manifesto are coming from the following countries:
Belgium: 7
Bulgaria: 1
Cyprus: 1
Finland: 2
France: 46
Georgia: 1
Germany: 1
Greece: 3
Hungary: 1
Ireland: 1
Poland: 1
Portugal: 1
Serbia: 1
Spain: 30
Switzerland: 1
UK: 2
