On December 12^th and 13^th 2017, the First Meeting of the InnoPlatform Project took place in the Computer Technology Institute and Press "Diophantus" (CTI) Premises in Patras, Greece.

 INNOPLATFORM aims at improving the competitiveness of the Balkan Mediterranean region by advancing existing knowledge on business model innovations and developing a set of tools (InnoTools) and services (InnoScorecard and InnoRegion) for improving SMEs opportunities, capacities, and knowledge in introducing product and process innovations.

 The 6 Project Partners are:

 Lead Partner: Centre for Knowledge Management (CKM)

PP2: Computer Technology Institute and Press "Diophantus" (CTI)

PP3: UET Centre (UET)

PP4: Burgas Free University (BFU)

PP5: Limassol Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI)

PP6: Association of Information Technology Companies of Northern Greece (SEPVE)

The First Day of the meeting, focused on the first 4 Work Packages (WPs) of the InnoPlatform Project and the Leaders of each WP presented the current situation and progress of the tasks, and at the same time organised the next steps which were analysed during the Second Day after the Steering Committee Meeting.

 Deadlines were set for the next tasks of the Project with focus on the National Studies, the development and analysis of the InnoScorecard, development of a Regional Balkan-Mediterranean InnoScorecard and the development of the InnoRegion under WP3.

Also, the foundations of WP4 for the development of the InnoTools and WP5 for the creation of the Centres of Excellence in 5 Partner Countries were discussed, and in early 2018 is expected that implementation of these activities will be put into motion.

The meeting was very successful and all partner representatives and experts answered the most critical questions and generated the timeline, in order to provide the expected results of InnoPlatform in the next months.

USEFUL TERMS:

INNOSCORECARD

Services that will rank partner’s countries and compare the BM area with the EU providing information to policymakers, researchers, potential and present SMEs on current challenges in the area of the innovation potential.

 INNOREGION

Services that will focus on partner's regions with an aim of providing services that support innovations in the dominant emerging industries – help the clustering in the industries.

 INNOTOOLS

Set of tools for supporting the successful introduction and implementation of innovations in SMEs.