Emerging ecosystems for entrepreneurship in Europe (part I)

I got to this post when reading David Hornik blog on ‘Entrepreneurship in Europe’. To a large extent I understand his opinion and agree with most of what he is writing but there are some differences. A first difference is on the ecosystem for entrepreneurship.

There are several regional ecosystems for entrepreneurs emerging all over
Europe. You won’t just find them in Europe’s major cities like Amsterdam and
Paris and that is why they’re sometimes harder to find by non-Europeans. Todays emerging innovative regions can be found in the regions around Leuven (BE), Cambridge (UK), Heidelberg (DE), Nice (FR) or Tampere (FIN).

Europe, a continent of regions 

Currently, Europe counts 25 member countries. The last 10 joined in May 2004 and another 2 will join next year in 2007. Among these countries there are a lot of differences, culturally and of course economically. When making a comparison between entrepreneurship in Europe, Asia and the US, one needs to be careful not to make judgments based on what is happening on a continental level. Entrepreneurial activity very much depends on the ecosystem the entrepreneur is living in and that is on a more local level and that is why the smaller region is very much important. If one starts to compare regions then you still need to know what can be compared because there still remain large differences. These difference are very much present in Europe, partly because the heterogeneity in culture (North Europe vis-à-vis South Europe) but also very much because of the different historical backgrounds of the different EU member countries (West Europe vis-à-vis East Europe). But these differences are changing (of which the economic difference quicker than the cultural one). The catch-up of Ireland, labeled ‘Celtic Tiger’, with the rest of West-Europe is a good example.

Regions of innovative clusters and entrepreneurial hotspots

Even within the innovative and emerging regions there are siginificant differences. As an example take the region I come from, the Flanders region (for a nice impression of the region visit www.flandersdc.be) in Belgium. Even within this relatively small region we have several smaller sector focused cluster networks which are part or act as a matrix of the larger innovative region and are located around cities, eg. the DSP Valley around Leuven, an I-City or multimedia cluster around Hasselt, a biotech cluster FlandersBio around Gent. Creating so many clusters is all very nice but one should be careful not to create empty boxes. Real value should be provided to the entrepreneurs.

Interregional growth triangles 

On the other hand there is this ‘glocalisation’ meaning that the global ecosystom also very much matters. Even that some smaller regions such as the Cambridge region have little problems in marketing themselves internationally, other regions of similar size, breeding a similiar amount of entrepreneurial entrepreneurs and start-ups are confronted with limited global awareness. That is when some some smaller regions/clusters joined forces, even across national borders, partly to avoid competition among the different cities involved but in particular to better put themselves on the world map as a truly innovative and emerging regions. A good example is ELAT or Eindhoven(Netherlands)-Leuven(Belgium)-Aken(Germany) Triangle incorporating the region of Eindhoven or Brainport Eindhoven (birthplace of bluechip companies Philips and ASML, the region is the most innovative region of the Netherlands), the region Leuven and the region of Aken(DE)/Maastricht(NL)/Hasselt(BE). 

For more info on all the European regions that are currently dealing with the implementation of innovation strategies go to Innovating Regions Europe (IRE); this network counts more then 235 regions from Europe + associated countries. To get some insight on what is happening in the US and Asia, one can go to the Stanford Project on Regions of Innovation and Entrepreneurship

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