On the 15th and 16th of March, EBN welcomed the staff of new and existing EU|BICs to familiarise themselves with EU|BICs’ work and their role in fostering innovation and supporting entrepreneurs in the whole lifecycle of their startups: from the idea to internationalisation.

Giordano Dichter, Head of EU|BIC Services, Robert Sanders, Head of International Projects, and David Tee, Head of Membership Services,  gave a comprehensive overview of EBN’s services to its members, EBN’s role in EU projects supporting entrepreneurship and regional economic development, and explained the added value that the EU|BIC network provides to its  members, including smoother internationalisation processes. Giordano, the lead trainer, has been managing the EU|BIC’s trademark for the past 8 years, making sure EU|BIC adhere to the criteria as defined by EBN’s BIC Quality Mark Criteria. During the training, he provided an in-depth overview of the EU|BIC’s criteria, the structure and activities of typical EU|BICs, as well as different phases in the incubation service value chain (stimulation, pre-incubation, incubation, and post-incubation).

Giordano Dichter, Head of EU|BIC Services, with participants coming from new EU|BICs and new staff from EU|BICs based in Poland, Germany, Austria, the U.K, Italy, India, Sweden, and France.

Moreover, the participants had the chance to hear some of the network’s success stories presented by some of the EU|BIC’s  CEOs:  Patrice Thiry, Diego de Biasio, and John Brennan.

Patrice Thiry, CEO of La Maison de l'Entreprise (Belgium) and EBN’s board member, explained the very first phase of the incubation process- entrepreneurship stimulation, successfully running in La Maison de l'Entreprise via startup weekends, hackathons, social media networking, pitches and other channels gathering mainly university students. 

Diego de Biasio, CEO of Technoport (Luxembourg), talked about the incubation phase at Technoport, a stringent selection process supported by external expertise to ensure the best business concepts are admitted to Technoport. Diego also described the other services provided by Technoport, co-working space and Fab Lab that complement each other allowing the startup prototypes to be 3D printed in-house while at the same time providing flexible office space for entrepreneurs.

Together with David Tee, John Brennan, coming from Westbic in Ireland, explained the internationalisation process for startups and the challenges they might face, such as lack of market knowledge, lack of awareness of internationalisation support measures, inability to adapt the products or services to the target country etc. However,  EU|BICs’ network  provides an excellent platform to ensure “soft landing” and smoother internationalisation due to EU|BICs’ understanding of the local markets in which startups might want to expand.

Bruno Wattenbergh, senior advisor at EY,  former CEO of Impulse, professor at Solvay Brussels School - Economics & Management, active in entrepreneurship and management consulting scene in Belgium, gave an exciting presentation about the importance of the Business Model Canvas and method used to validate startup ideas at a low cost, constantly reshaping strategies depending on the environment while drawing examples from well-known companies around the world.

Bruno Wattenbergh

Audra Shallal, Founder and Managing Director of BOSS Consulting, and advisory board member of several business angel networks, provided deep insight into alternative methods of financing startups such as crowdfunding and business angels as a support to startups at different stages of maturity. 

Audra Shallal 

The participants also had the opportunity to network and share their EU|BIC’s best practices. Karl Martin, one of the participants coming from  Matikem, found the training very interesting and useful:

“I found the workshop to the point. It’s a fantastic tool in order to learn from up-to-date techniques to support the creation of innovative projects within startups as well as mature companies and it gave me the opportunity to connect with potential partners : Europe and outside Europe.” 

This was EU|BIC Essential Training’s fourth edition but there will be more to come.

If interested, get in touch with us, and learn more about the trainings we provide.