Introduction 5 Chapter 1: a description of the organisational structure set up for the implementation of the Strategy 6
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During the first stage of the implementation process, the Priority Area Coordinators have focused on getting the Flagship Projects started. Regular meetings of the PACs and the Flagship Project Leaders have been successfully organised to facilitate cooperation. So far, the design and planning of the Flagships have to a large extent been funded by existing national or EU sources; however, there is a wish to explore the possibilities of financial engineering. Cooperation between Interact Point Turku, FP 7.2 "Create a Baltic Sea Fund for innovation and research", and the PACs, using BSR Stars as a test case, has already been initiated to explore this possibility. Flagship Projects 7.1 "BSR Stars", and 7.4 "BSR Health Region" have both developed a well-functioning governance structure, which has allowed the project leaders to formulate their visions and goals, develop strategies and activity plans, take decisions about priorities and initiate new cooperation. The PACs recommend the example of the High Level Group of BSR Stars, with 1-2 representatives from each participating country (BSR EU members, Norway and Iceland), as a good governance structure that could perhaps be useful to other EUSBSR Flagships. Both FP 7.1 and 7.4 are now in the first phase of implementation. They are co-funded by the Baltic Sea Region Programme 2007-13, and 7.4 also from the South Baltic Programme. Both Flagships have applied and/or will apply to other sources of funding to be able to initiate more activities. Cooperation between the BONUS secretariat and BSR Stars is being developed in order to jointly broaden the BONUS programme to also include clean tech innovation and eco-innovation. The BONUS secretariat has found the BSR Stars to be a suitable partner, facilitating the inclusion of innovation competences and persons responsible for innovation in ministries and innovation agencies of the BSR countries. Without the EUSBSR this had not been possible. Flagship Project 7.2, led by the Skane Region in Sweden, is now developing its governance structure and work plan. It has already been able to initiate interesting dialogues on future funding within the field of innovation. Flagship Project 7.5 "Setting up a science link" is today a cooperation project between DESY/Hamburg and the Swedish Research Council. The FPLs have started to create a network which initially will be focused on materials research in a broad sense. Considerable parts of research in the life sciences are focused on new research infrastructures (MAX IV / ESS / XFEL / PETRA III). The initiative has the potential to provide positive stimulus to the entire region by letting more researchers gain access to the facilities. Actions: Strategic actions:
Report: The PACs point out that this strategic action should be based on the results of all the Flagship Projects. Parts of such a strategy are currently being developed within the governance structures of the Flagship Projects. In order to develop a more complete strategy, a pre-study, defining focus, ambitions, boundaries and funding, is needed. Cooperative actions:
Report: The Swedish Patent Agency has, with its own resources, developed a database with more than 17 000 documents, which it will be possible to use for clean tech and eco innovation projects within the BSR. Flagship Projects (as examples):
Report: The long-term vision is to establish the BSR as a functional region22 recognised by global actors as the best innovation space hosting and deploying world-class expertise and strategic alliances in selected fields by using the Grand Challenges approach as its main logic. This approach identifies societal needs and challenges of the present time such as health, energy, clean water and climate change, and needs collaboration between different countries as well as between public and private actors. The aim is for the BSR in 2020 to be recognised as the most agile macro-region in the world in capabilities that require multi-disciplinary research and education, innovative and mobile talent as well as attractive business environments for companies, capital and policy learning. The rationale behind BSR STARS is to increase innovation capacity by creating larger critical mass of R&I resources, creating a larger home market for businesses (especially for SMEs) and developing complementary competencies for new types of collaboration. By linking and deploying the whole resource base of the BSR, the BSR STARS is aimed at shaping, expanding and integrating the market space and the resource base of the Region. The BSR STARS will develop collaboration for innovation work, ensuring it attracts other strong cooperation milieus worldwide. The BSR STARS will introduce systemic ways of working together. The BSR Stars programme, including strategy and activity plans for 2011-20, has been developed and approved by all 10 countries represented in the BSR Stars High Level Group (BSR EU members, Norway and Iceland). The governance structure of BSR Stars, with a High Level Group with representatives from ministries and innovation agencies in 10 countries, has proven to work well and created a platform for shared strategic actions in the area of innovation. The operational part, with three taskforces, has developed the action plan, but not yet started to implement the activities. A project called Stardust was approved for co-funding by the BSR programme 2007-13 in September 2010. More than 60 partners / associated partners from 10 countries are involved in Stardust. This project will test new instruments and tools for transnational cooperation in four different thematic areas: clean tech, health, telecommunication and sustainable transport. Five different projects will develop strategies to obtain global leading positions in their respective field. Finland has allocated recourses from national funds to two projects connected with BSR Stars, one is a food consortium between Finland, Sweden, Poland, Iceland, Denmark and Estonia and the other is the health project within Stardust. BSR Stars is also a test case for FP 7.2 in its work to propose more efficient models for funding transnational cooperation on innovation. It is hoped that this work will influence the next EU budget period 2014-20.
Report: The aim of this Flagship is to develop financial instruments that promote transnational and transregional innovation and research. In focus is both the coordination of different funding sources at the EU, national and regional levels as well as private funding within the existing programme period (2007-13) and the next programme period (2014-20). The Flagship is in the phase of collecting information on obstacles and opportunities related to the existing financial structure for the implementation of Flagship Projects within EUSBSR PA 7. This work is pursued in close cooperation with the Flagship 7.1. During 2010, the Lead Partner of the project investigated the financial conditions for the Flagship itself and found the right partners in the project. The managing phase of the Flagship was expected to be completed by June 2011.
Report: The PACs proposed that this project be included under FP 7.1
Report: The aim of this Flagship Project is to assist in promoting a knowledge-based, globally competitive health economy in the BSR and in solving the grand societal challenges of health within the Region, and to play a strong role in global health. The ScanBalt Health Region (SBHR) serves as an umbrella for a multitude of coordinated activities applying shared visions and values for the development of the Region and utilising a common communication and coordination structure. It promotes a bottom-up approach combined with a top-down advisory structure, which has been developed, tested and applied for the ScanBalt BioRegion since 2001. The SBHR Modus operandi is the result of intense dialogue and consultation with key stakeholders throughout the BSR. The ScanBalt Health Region has published two position papers: in February 2011 “Healthy Ageing: From biological fundamentals to clinical solutions“, and in March 2011 “EU Cohesion policies and the importance of macro-regions and regional clusters for smart growth and smart specialisation”. The ScanBalt Forum “Towards balanced regional development and smart specialisation between clusters” will be organised on 21-24 September 2011, where discussion, reporting and coordination on the ScanBalt Health Region will be a major topic.
Report: Baltic Science Link aims to create a network to ensure that research exchange programmes are created. These programmes can include local nodes of development within the relevant areas of research. It is hoped that the network will deepen cooperation in those areas where it is active, leading to joint ventures and investments. However, this will require that funding for these activities be made available. The network will initially be focused on materials research in a broad sense, in which important parts of research in the life sciences are especially focused on the new research infrastructures (MAX IV / ESS / XFEL / PETRA III). The initiative has the potential to provide positive stimulus to the entire region by letting more researchers gain access to the facilities. The project today is a cooperation between DESY/Hamburg and the Swedish Research Council, and there are several sub-projects on the way. The main activities are currently the sub-projects Science Link (SL) and Baltic Science Link 1 (BSL 1), and overall coordination. Science Link is the precursor project, mainly aimed at industrial users of the research infrastructures, while Baltic Science Link 1 is aimed at the build-up of academic users and a transnational access programme. Both sub-projects are awaiting funding decisions. The mapping, which is and will continue to be part of the coordination activities, needs to be continued as there are still areas which are not clear and contact that needs to be made. For example, the relationship has to be clarified with existing projects/networks that have similar goals, such as the existing network of academics within the macro-region.
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