SISP launches member forum for expertise and collaboration

Sweden has incubators and science parks all over the country that operate in different sectors. Most work with startups, scaleups, existing businesses and the public sector in all kinds of industries, i.e. breadth, while others have clear niches. A natural link is often that the actors offer business development and other support in line with the areas of strength they have in their region. As an additional part of the membership offer, SISP will organise forums to bring together members in different areas, starting with food.

SISP currently has around 60 members offering niche support in around 20 areas, such as life science, ICT, IndTech, mobility and gaming. Most commonly, the various innovation environments offer both breadth in their business development support, but also niche expert support in their area of strength. Increasingly, several actors are collaborating across regional borders to offer companies the best possible support, regardless of where in the country they are located.

– Sweden’s incubators and science parks contribute daily to shaping Sweden’s new, innovative business community. As a member organisation, we need to constantly develop to strengthen collaboration with and between our members. By enabling member-driven forums, reinforced with our support nationally, we increase the power of both collaboration, knowledge sharing and influence, says Stina Lantz, CEO SISP.

Member-driven mobilisation in food

Krinova in Kristianstad has its profile area in food. Together with Innovatum, Dalarnas Science Park, Science Park Gotland, Bizmaker and Södertälje Science Park, they have found several common denominators to collaborate on in the innovative development of the food of the future. As a member organisation, SISP now offers an arena for pooling development in food in its own forum.

– Those of us with food as our area of strength have much that binds us together, both in terms of what and how we work with companies from start-up to acceleration, but also in many of the challenges we face as innovation support organisations. Being able to gather around both opportunities and challenges we face in a network within SISP facilitates and strengthens our opportunities to be visible to decision-makers and other stakeholders, but also to other future networks within SISP in cross-industry collaborations,” says Hannes van Lunteren, head of KrinovaFood.

National expert and advisory body

An increasingly important part of SISP’s work as a membership and industry organisation is to act as an expert and referral body for issues related to innovation and startups towards national policy makers. By organising members into chapters/forums, SISP will be able to coordinate referrals to members with expertise in different areas, ensuring that members’ views and recommendations in specific areas reach decision-makers.

– SISP has become an established consultation body for issues relating to research and innovation. By bringing members together, we can also streamline advocacy work and act as a unified voice with specific expertise, from across the country, when it is relevant. That must be the best way to bring about change? concludes Stina Lantz.