Category: General-en

• The main objective of Enerbuild is to mitigate the effects of climate change by raising awareness among citizens, companies, and institutions in the Canary Islands and strengthening innovation ecosystems at a national and regional level.
• The island of Gran Canaria will host the 13th International Canagua and Energy Fair from 9^th to 11^th November at the Infecar exhibition centre, which will bring together the most important players in the energy and water sector on the national scene.
• Juanma Revuelta, of Finnova, will give a conference on Wednesday 9th at 18:00 where he will talk about: the Canary Islands before the absorption of EU funds until 2030. Nextgen, REPowerEU and will provide exemplification through case studies such as Enerbuild and Life Ecodigestion 2.0.

Combat climate change by relying on smart-building technology and the Internet of Things. This is the main objective of Enerbuild, led by the Gran Canaria Island Energy Council (CIEGC) and with the participation of the Finnova Foundation and the Macedonian Innovation Lab Smart-Up within the framework of EIT Climate-KIC, which will be presented these days at the 13^th International Canagua and Energy Fair held at the Infecar fairgrounds in Gran Canaria.

The presentation and dissemination of Enerbuild have great importance in this Fair, as it is a project that is being developed in a pilot building of the Energy Island Council of Gran Canaria (CIEGC). The project also involves the participation of the Internet of Things platform HiperWare, a tool of the German group BPS International dedicated to Big Data, and the Portuguese smart maintenance platform Infraspeak, which will serve as technological pillars of a combined solution based on analysing and monitoring supply systems by collecting Big Data. In parallel to detecting anomalies and providing recommendations on system optimisation, Smartup, a Macedonian innovation lab collaborating with Finnova, brings its knowledge, skills, and resources to find synergies that foster the exchange of experiences between North Macedonia, Europe and the outermost regions such as the Canary Islands and its knowledge, skills and resources in order to find synergies that foster the exchange of experiences between North Macedonia, Europe and outermost regions such as the Canary Islands and its knowledge, skills and resources in order to find synergies that foster the exchange of experiences between North Macedonia, Europe and outermost regions such as the Canary Islands and the Canary Islands.

With a total budget of 156,654 euros, 75% funded by EIT Climate-KIC, Enerbuild aims to demonstrate how good management of European funds, an international collaboration between public-private entities, and a commitment to technological innovation can help to achieve the objectives of the 2030 Agenda and build a sustainable Europe. A presentation that all attendees will be able to enjoy both at the stand that will be available throughout the fair, as well as during the intervention of Juanma Revuelta, CEO of Finnova, on Wednesday 9^th November at 18:00 hours, in an environment in which all the most representative actors of the water and energy binomial will be present.

About Finnova 

Finnova is a Spanish-Belgian non-profit foundation based in Brussels (Belgium) with a presence in Spain in the Valencian Community, the Basque Country, Andalusia, the Community of Madrid, Extremadura, and the Canary Islands. The foundation works for the promotion and development of innovation and entrepreneurship at the EU level and operates through collaborations and partnerships in all EU countries. Finnova’s experience in leading communication activities and dissemination of European projects is combined with a solid proven track record in business creation and business support programs, such as accelerators, incubators, and incubators. It is also committed to the training and employability of young people.

About the Gran Canaria Island Energy Council

An organisation associated with the Cabildo de Gran Canaria was created to promote clean energies, stimulating different energy-saving and efficiency policies in homes and economic sectors of the islands, while at the same time promoting research, development and technological innovation together with town councils and other institutions.

About SmartUp

The social innovation lab, located in Skopje (North Macedonia), dedicates its resources and skills to catalyse innovation to offer novel solutions to social problems, connecting institutions, organisations and collectives to different opportunities or projects.

About EIT Climate-KIC

EIT Climate-KIC is a community dedicated to innovation and knowledge in climate action. It identifies and supports different initiatives or projects that contribute to the fight against climate change and promote decarbonisation and energy transition.

It is part of the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT), an independent body of the European Union dedicated to increasing Europe’s competitiveness in areas such as sustainability, economic growth and job creation.

About BPS Group

BPS Group is a German company operating in the field of technology and the real estate market. The firm has developed HiPerWare, an end-to-end platform that with the help of Big Data and the Internet of Things can perform technically complex real estate operations in real-time. The data, obtained through sensors placed in buildings or equipment, are analysed in the cloud and processed against thousands of variables that allow to visualise operational processes in 3D and improve the efficiency of maintenance.

About Infraspeak

Infraspeak is the developer of an intelligent maintenance management platform, a state-of-the-art software capable of connecting to different resources such as platforms and sensors. Infraspeak has extensive experience in the implementation of its software and its connection to the Internet of Things sensors, bringing its services to more than 400 customers around the world.

About the International Canagua and Energy Fair

After more than four years of hiatus, conditioned by its biennial nature and the Covid-19 pandemic, the 13^th edition of the international Canagua and Energy Fair aims to offer a space in which clean energies are the core. To this end, it will provide more than 50 exhibitors and conferences to facilitate new business opportunities, the generation of synergies, new generation models, efficiency, desalination, water reuse, investment, promotion and collaboration within the water and energy binomial.

All those interested in participating in this benchmark event on the islands will be able to purchase their tickets to attend free of charge in the next few days at http://www.canagua.es.

The days 8^th, 9^th and 11^th of November, it is celebrating the event “Woman Startup Europe Awards, Fuerteventura Special Edition”. This awards which seeks to reward the best innovation projects in the field of female entrepreneurship are an initiative by the city council of Fuerteventura and Finnova Foundation, in the framework of the StartUp Europe Awards, endorsed by the European Commission.

In these days there will be two modalities in which interested women can participate in the event that is framed in AFRIMAC 2 (MAC/2.3d/296), co-financed by the Operational Programme for Territorial Cooperation INTERREG MAC 2014-2020. The first of the modalities, AFRIMAC – 100 Women, will be held on the 8^th and 9^th, with the collaboration of women for tech and the accelerator Startup Europe Accelerator.

In this modality, women participants of the Training Programme for Women Entrepreneurs from Senegal, Mauritania, Cape Verde and Fuerteventura will have the opportunity to present their project or innovative idea on leadership and business management. From them, one of the six finalists will be selected and will go on to the final that will take place on the 11th at the Women Impact Summit.

The second and last modality will take place on 11^th of November: the Women Impact Summit. This modality is dedicated to women from all over Europe who want to participate and share their project, in any of its phases. In this final, the winner of the final AFRIMAC – 100 Women and the winner of the Women Startup Europe Awards will be announced.

There will be an international jury, composed by:

• Ambassador Sena Siaw-Boateng, Ambassador of Ghana in Belgium and the Kingdom of Luxembourg.
• Bouchra Al Mehraj, entrepreneur.
• Katy Martínez, President of Martínez Hermanos Foundation.
• Lina Gálvez, Member of the European Parliament.
• Émilie Lubukayi, Strategic & Business manager of W.E.E Consulting.
• Rosa Martín, from “Nos Movemos” Foundation.

This jury will evaluate each proposal, and will name a winner who will receive a prize valued at €5,000, with mentoring and training by experts in the field for the winning project, as well as publicity in different mass media.

About SEUA

The Startup Europe Awards (SEUA) is an initiative driven by the European Commission, supported by the Committee of the Regions and the European Parliament and implemented by the Finnova Foundation in collaboration with StartUp Europe. It is an open innovation tool that allows companies to identify talented startups capable of solving today’s challenges in multiple areas. Its mission is to help Startups and Scaleups become more efficient, smarter and more successful. These awards are a useful tool to promote knowledge sharing, add value to the entrepreneurial ecosystem and help startups to grow and position themselves in the market.

About AFRIMAC 2

AFRIMAC 2 (www.afrimac.org) is a programme for business, technological, entrepreneurial and innovative exchange in areas of high economic impact between the Canary Islands and West Africa. The main objective is to improve the internationalisation of companies in the cooperation area through the creation of networks and the generation of a knowledge environment with a gender focus.

About Woman Impact Summit (WIS)

The Woman Impact Summit (www.womanimpactsummit.com) is an international initiative within the AFRIMAC 2 project to share different ways of addressing economic opportunities, visibility and access for women of all backgrounds, with participants, regional leaders, entrepreneurs and businesswomen working on special initiatives for women on both sides of the Atlantic.

About Women for Tech

Women For Tech is the Finnova Foundation’s initiative to support innovation, disruptive projects and public-private partnerships for women. They support various projects such as Finnova-Technovation Girls Challenges to promote STEAM careers in young people or projects to promote female entrepreneurship.

About Finnova Foundation Finnova is a foundation working for the promotion and development of innovation and entrepreneurship at EU level. Based in Brussels, it operates through collaborations and partnerships in all EU countries. Finnova’s expertise in leading European project communication and dissemination activities is combined with a strong proven track record in start-ups and business support programmes, such as accelerators, incubators and selection and award ceremonial events.

20.10.2022. Within the framework of the European Week of Regions and Cities (#EURegionsWeek), the Interreg CILIFO project held in Monchique, on October 13, 2022, the conference “Territorial cohesion and green transition in fire prevention and protection (Spain and Portugal).

This event, organized by the Finnova Foundation within its main actions and as a beneficiary entity of the CILIFO project, had the objective of promoting territorial cohesion in the fight against forest fires, as well as disseminating and sharing with other collaborating partners about its operation, structure, activities and organizational elements, among others. In addition, they discussed common intervention protocols between Spain and Portugal and the importance of generating patents and intellectual property protection around these issues, to generate good practices and collaborate in the green transition, which requires waste management that favor the production and spread of fires.

Juanma Revuelta, CEO of Finnova, and Jose Manuel Requena, manager of European projects at Finnova, welcomed the event and presented the Interreg CILIFO (Iberian Center for Research and Fight against Forest Fires) project. CILIFO works not only for an effective control of forest fires, but also to address their consequences and prevent their materialization from the base, through training and a mitigation-oriented approach with an emphasis on the rural environment. For her part, Lola Bordas, project, communication and marketing technician, Fundación Finnova, presented the accelerator Firefighting Open Innovation Lab – CILIFO (FOIL-CILIFO), through which companies and technologies focused on the prevention and extinction of forest fires and its subsequent management work together to put an end to this serious problem that affects significant amounts of land each year.

During the technical session, Carmen Toledo de la Torre, head of the Technological Information Unit, of the Spanish Office of Trademark Patents of the Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Tourism of the Government of Spain, intervened to present the study of Patents and Control of Forest Fires, focused as a cooperation experience between Spain and Portugal. Finally, Yolanda Ambrosio Torrijos, from the Higher Technical School of Forestry, Forestry and Natural Environment Engineering of the Polytechnic University of Madrid, presented the main conclusions on fire prevention and extinction from the study on Patents and Control of Forest Fires.

The full session can be viewed at the following link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gg_dsNMHuMQ&ab_channel=FINNOVA  

27.09.2021. The European Week of Regions and Cities (#EURegionsWeek) is the largest Brussels-based annual event dedicated to cohesion policy. Next Thursday, October 13, 2022, the CILIFO project and its accelerator Firefighting Open Innovation Lab – CILIFO celebrate an event entitled “Territorial cohesion and green transition in fire prevention and protection” in Monchique (Portugal) organized by the Finnova Foundation, as a beneficiary entity of the CILIFO project.

The event, which has the collaboration and participation of the Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Tourism of the Government of Spain through its Patent and Trademark Office, the Polytechnic University of Madrid and the Municipal Chamber of Monchique, will address the importance of generating patents and protection of intellectual property around the dissemination of common intervention protocols between Spain and Portugal. In addition, the Firefighting Open Innovation Lab – CILIFO (FOIL-CILIFO), the first accelerator in the forest fire and management sector, will be presented as an example of good practices and collaboration in the green transition that requires the management of waste that encourages production and the spread of fires.

Event registration Link:
https://event.cilifo.eu/

Agenda

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26.10.2022. On the 2nd of November, the Consortium of Tourism and Congresses of A Coruña, the City Council of Ferrol and the Finnova Foundation, present the first seminar on Napoleonic Routes in Galicia-North Portugal: “SMART TOURISM DESTINATION”.

The seminar will start at 16:00h (Brussels time), in online format. “SMART TOURISM DESTINATION” has the purpose of making participants aware of the importance of the conservation of heritage values, as well as an economic engine based on environmental sustainability, contributing to reduce territorial and social disparities in the area and increasing the economic activity of the Euroregion Galicia-Norte Portugal.

Registration:
https://evento0211.napoctep.eu/

During the conference, the speakers will try to outline the possible project on the creation of multiple tourist, cultural and heritage routes and itineraries, related to the Napoleonic Invasions in the Iberian Peninsula, which will articulate the economic and social fabric and benefit the Galicia-North Portugal Euroregion. In addition, the good practices of the INTERREG project “NAPOCTEP” will be presented. This event is registered in the official agenda of the European Week of Regions and Cities 2022 (#EURegionsWeek), an annual event where the territorial capacity to generate growth and cohesion is shown.

Agends:

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• Adrián Noheda, European Projects Manager at the Finnova Foundation, presented the initiative and its actions.
• Enerbuild proposes to combat climate change by relying on smart-building technology and the Internet of Things.

On 20 October, the seminar “Creating Synergies and Sharing Experiences between Projects in Different Regions” was held in the framework of the European Week of Regions and Cities. Different European projects in the field of sustainable energy and their contribution to the European Commission’s “RePowerEU” Plan were presented. The European energy optimisation Enerbuild project was one of the protagonists of the event together with LIFE ECODIGESTION 2.0.

The event was structured in three panels. The first one was devoted to an institutional presentation; the second one focused specifically on European funds and the third one was attended by representatives of different European projects focused on sustainable energy. Juan Manuel Revuelta, CEO of the Finnova Foundation, kicked off the event. His presentation focused on sharing his long professional experience in European funds, as well as presenting a holistic and strategic vision of LIFE ECODIGESTION 2.0 project.

The intervention of Adrián Noheda, European Project Manager at the Finnova Foundation, was part of the last panel. In his speech, he presented the new energy optimisation project led by the Energy Council of Gran Canaria, Enerbuild, which has a total budget of 156,654 euros, of which almost 75% will be financed by the EIT Climate KIC. In Noheda’s words, this initiative “proposes to combat climate change by relying on smart-building technology and the Internet of Things“. The main objective of the initiative is to mitigate the effects of climate change by raising awareness among citizens, companies and institutions in the Canary Islands and strengthening innovation ecosystems at national and regional level.

Thus, it presents an energy optimisation system that will be developed in the pilot building “El Sabinal” of the Cabildo de Gran Canaria. This will rely on the work of the Portuguese intelligent maintenance platform InfraSpeak, which will detect anomalies and provide recommendations for system optimisation.

Moisés Alvaro, Ecosystem Developer for Southern Europe at EIT Climate-KIC, presented the work done by EIT Climate KIC with the support of the European Institute of Innovation and Technology to accelerate the transition to a zero-carbon society. He stressed that, with such ambitious goals and short-term targets for a zero-carbon society by 2030, a systemic approach needed to be adapted. “The change we are really committed to is systemic, as it implies changing dynamics, so the challenge is not just about replacing the energy source or technological fixes, but about a complete transformation of the system,” he said. Moisés concluded his presentation by stressing that the Commission’s proposed strategic and legislative plan, RePowerEU, is a great tool to ensure the energy transition, but that “it needs a systemic perspective in order to have a real impact”.

The project partners

Enerbuild is developed by a consortium of beneficiaries consisting of:

Finnova is the European foundation for innovation financing. Its objectives are to promote public-private cooperation through its knowledge and experience in European funding instruments, addressing societal challenges such as youth employment, entrepreneurship, the UN SDGs, the circular economy, waste recovery, sustainable tourism and the fight against climate change.

Social innovation lab, located in Skopje (North Macedonia), dedicates its resources and skills to catalyse innovation to offer novel solutions to social problems, connecting institutions, organisations and collectives to different opportunities or projects.

BPS Group is a German company operating in the field of technology and the real estate market. The firm has developed HiPerWare, an end-to-end platform that with the help of Big Data and the Internet of Things can perform technically complex real estate operations in real time. The data, obtained through sensors placed in buildings or equipment, are analysed in the cloud and processed against thousands of variables that allow to visualise operational processes in 3D and improve the efficiency of maintenance.

Infraspeak is the Portuguese developer of an intelligent maintenance management platform, a state-of-the-art software capable of connecting to different resources such as platforms and sensors. Infraspeak has extensive experience in the implementation of its software and its connection to Internet of Things sensors, bringing its services to more than 400 customers around the world.

• The aim of the European FIPAS initiative is to measure the risk of the fire in order to prevent and identify the causes of fire.
• In Spain, 290,000 hectares have burned so far this year.

Brussels, 19^th of October of 2022. The European initiative FIPAS (Forest Fire Prediction Alarm System) could prevent 3% of the planet’s surface from burning annually. This was stated by Juanma Revuelta, CEO of Finnova, during the event “Territorial cohesion and green transition in fire prevention and protection” organised in the framework of the Interreg-CILIFO programme in the Portuguese town of Monchique on 13 October.

Lola Bordás, marketing director at Finnova, and Juan Manuel Revuelta explained at the event the FIPAS project led by Nassat, supported by Climate-Kic to implement a pilot project in Pechvevo, North Macedonia. The main objective of the initiative is to measure the risk of fire in order to prevent it, as well as to identify the causes that could be fuelling it. By this way, FIPAS could prevent a repetition next year of the 290,000 hectares burnt in Spain, as Juan Manuel Revuelta pointed out. A year described as “annus horribilis” in terms of forest management and fire fighting.

Every year, an average of 3 % of the planet’s surface is burned. “The lungs of the planet that allow us to generate oxygen and fight climate change could be less affected with FIPAS,” Juan Manuel added. In order for this not to happen, “we are working with international organisations on new projects in this area, such as FIPAS, a living example of this”, said Lola Bordás.

Furthermore, in order to carry out this initiative, FIPAS has a total budget of 144,500,00 euros, of which 80% will be funded by the EIT Climate-KIC, the EU’s climate innovation agency working to accelerate the transition to a resilient, carbon-free world through systems transformation.

About NASSAT

Nassat is a leading company in the Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) sector that addresses particularly complex problems affecting organizations, companies, institutions and communities, inherent to deficiencies in telecommunications infrastructures, in many cases non-existent.

About Finnova

Finnova is the European foundation for innovation financing. Its objectives are to promote public-private cooperation through its knowledge and experience in European funding instruments, addressing societal challenges such as youth employment, entrepreneurship, the UN SDGs, the circular economy, waste recovery, sustainable tourism and the fight against climate change.

About Climate-KIC

EIT Climate-KIC is the EU’s climate innovation agency working to accelerate the transition to a resilient, carbon-free world through systems transformation. Headquartered in Amsterdam, EIT Climate-KIC operates from 13 centres across Europe and is active in 39 countries. EIT Climate-KIC was established in 2010 and is primarily funded by the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT), an agency of the European Union. As a Knowledge and Innovation Community (KIC), EIT Climate-KIC brings together more than 400 partners from business, academia, public and non-profit sectors to create networks of expertise through which innovative products, services and systems are developed and commercialised for greater societal impact.

19 October 2022. The European initiative FIPAS (Forest Fire Prediction Alarm System) was presented as an example of good practice during the Session on harnessing good preventive practices in forest fire management, held on 13 October.

Agustín Quesada, Project Manager at Finnova, was in charge of explaining the European initiative led by Nassat, a company allied to the Firefighting Open Innovation Lab, which has a system of forest fire prediction alarms to measure the risk of forest fires occurring and identify the causes that feed them thanks to Artificial Intelligence. Thus, it also operates at national and regional level.

By this way, FIPAS is one of the essential elements to provide data and public input to the Interreg project for the Survey for the compilation of good practices in Forest Fires along the Raya. Thus, working hand in hand, both initiatives will be able to prevent and extinguish forest fires more effectively.

About NASSAT

Nassat is a leading company in the Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) sector that addresses particularly complex problems affecting organizations, companies, institutions and communities, inherent to deficiencies in telecommunications infrastructures, in many cases non-existent.

About Finnova

Finnova is the European foundation for innovation financing. Its objectives are to promote public-private cooperation through its knowledge and experience in European funding instruments, addressing societal challenges such as youth employment, entrepreneurship, the UN SDGs, the circular economy, waste recovery, sustainable tourism and the fight against climate change.

About Climate-KIC

EIT Climate-KIC is the EU’s climate innovation agency working to accelerate the transition to a resilient, carbon-free world through systems transformation. Headquartered in Amsterdam, EIT Climate-KIC operates from 13 centres across Europe and is active in 39 countries. EIT Climate-KIC was established in 2010 and is primarily funded by the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT), an agency of the European Union. As a Knowledge and Innovation Community (KIC), EIT Climate-KIC brings together more than 400 partners from business, academia, public and non-profit sectors to create networks of expertise through which innovative products, services and systems are developed and commercialised for greater societal impact.

• The Lithuanian Minister of Environment Simonas Gentvilas, representatives of Eurotex and professors from the universities of Kaunas, Piedmont and Veneto presented the main barriers that the textile sector must face to combat climate change
• Partner Finnova presented the CirCoAX by CircularInnoBooster and Adelante Ventana 2 projects and multiple European funding tools to develop sustainable innovations in the sector

The EU4Bussines textile consortium together with Eurochambres held a hybrid conference on Thursday 6 October in Kaunas, Lithuania, which was attended by leading experts in this area where they presented the main points to combat and proposals and projects to address these issues. Among the speakers, the presence of the partner Finnova Foundation and its general director, Juan Manuel Revuelta, who presented the CirCoAX by CircularInnoBooster project co-financed by the European Commission under the COSME programme, its extensions at European level with the Nextextilegeneration initiative and in Latin America with the Adelante Ventana 2 initiative.

CirCoAX by CircularInnoBooster was an example of good practice in this conference, which was celebrating its sixth edition. This year, the Lithuanian Minister of the Environment, Simonas Gentvilas, European entities active in the sector such as Eurotex, and professors from the universities of Kaunas, Piemonte and Veneto met to discuss sustainability and circular economy in the textile sector. The Spanish-Belgian foundation Finnova added value with the presentation of its initiatives Nextextilegeneration, a platform that gives visibility to the 4 COSME projects that share the same objective of transforming fashion and textiles, and Adelante Ventana 2, an initiative that, together with the Chamber of Commerce of Bogotá and the Sustainable Fashion Cluster of Peru, aims to promote sustainability in the fashion sector for its internationalisation, through a programme of cooperation activities.

In addition to sharing the good practices and vision of alliances created with this European fashion and textile project, Revuelta also highlighted the importance of the European Union’s financial tools to achieve the necessary transformation of this highly polluting sector. Among others, he mentioned the NextGenerationEU funds which, with 2,018 trillion euros, is the largest economic recovery plan in history, 12 times the Marshall Plan. He also highlighted the LIFE ENVIRONMENT programme, a tool aimed at innovation in climate change mitigation and adaptation with a total budget of 5.4 billion euros for this 2021-2027 framework.  

Revuelta’s intervention highlighted a holistic approach to European political and financial strategies. In this sense, the director of Finnova took up the New European Bauhaus to highlight that projects such as CirCoAX by CircularInnoBooster and its 30 accelerated entities will be supported under this programme. He therefore invited those present to take advantage of financial tools and create projects together. “Some, such as INTERREG, which allow the exchange of good practices and cooperation, or, in view of 2023, which will be the European year of skills and competences, the ERASMUS programme, can boost training in digitisation in the sector,” he concluded.

About COSME   

COSME is the Competitiveness of Small and Medium-sized Enterprises programme of the European Commission’s Executive Agency for Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (EASME).  

Through this programme, assistance is provided to SMEs to help them develop their business models, access finance, and internationalise. It also supports public administrations in improving the business environment and facilitating economic growth in the European Union. During the 2014-2020 funding period, this programme earmarked €2.3 billion to support SMEs. 

About Finnova   Finnova is a foundation working for the promotion and development of innovation and entrepreneurship at EU level. Based in Brussels, it operates through collaborations and partnerships in all EU countries. Finnova’s expertise in leading European project communication and dissemination activities is combined with a strong proven track record in start-ups and business support programmes, such as accelerators, incubators and ceremonial event selection and awarding.

• The startups provide innovative solutions to the challenges of the ecological transition in cities. Furthermore, they are committed to the sustainable and smart transformation of cities, innovative entrepreneurship in the field of the circular economy, energy efficiency and the fight against climate change.

• The awards were given at an event held within the framework of             S-Moving and Greencities held at FYCMA.

The startups Cimico, URBIM DT, Scoobic Urban Mobility and Washa Logistics SL have won the “Greencities & S-Moving StartUp Europe Awards” in the Municipal Waste to Energy, Greencities & New Bauhaus, S-Moving and Last Mille and Digital S-Moving Startup categories, respectively. The winners will benefit, among others, from a mentoring programme to access European funds.

The prizes were awarded at the “Palacio de Ferias y Congresos de Málaga” (FYCMA) within the framework of the S-Moving and Greencities conference. In addition to the winners, the event was attended by some of the members of the jury, such as Carmen Alonso, Councilor for Mobility of the Fuerteventura Island Council together with Carlos David Gutiérrez (technical advisor), Massimiliano Dragoni, Senior Policy Officer at European Commission, Ainara Renteria Tazo, Head Automotive and Mobility sector at Gómez-Acebo & Pombo and Alberto Moreno, Managing Director of T-Box Delivery, 

The jury, made up of representatives from the European Institute of Innovation & Technology (EIT) of the European Commission; the Finnova Foundation; Málaga TechPark; Diario Sur; the European PropTech Association; the Junta de Andalucía; the Consejería de Transformación Económica, Industria, Conocimiento y Universidades (Regional Ministry of Economic Transformation, Industry, Knowledge and Universities); Andalucía Conectada; the University of Málaga; and the Málaga city council, has highly valued the applications received and has highlighted the difficulty in selecting the best projects presented in this edition. All of them come from startups and technologically advanced companies in the environmental sector. They also have innovative capacity at local, regional, national, and international level and are looking for pilot cities where they can apply their ingenuity. “We have evaluated the proposals submitted based on the social and environmental impact of the project, innovation and use of disruptive technologies, internationalisation and long-term objectives,” explained Dragoni. 

Winners

Inés Larrea Villanueva, CEO of CIMICO, received the award in the Municipal Waste to Energy category. Her project, Mapyfa, achieves a double objective, greatly facilitating the generation of biogas and drastically reducing (80%) the energy consumption of the biological process of wastewater treatment plants. In this way, it doubly reduces the impact on the environment and their operating costs.

In the Greencities & New Bauhaus category, María Pascual Sáez, General Manager Urbim DT, collected the award. The winning project aims to contribute to the understanding of data and its relationship with space as a means to design better buildings, infrastructures and communities for a sustainable and ethical planet. In short, to help asset managers make their communities more efficient and healthier.

José María Gómez Márquez, CEO of Scoobic Urban Mobility, received the award in the S-Moving category with a project for three-wheeled vehicles capable of transporting large loads, with zero emissions and helping logistics to become profitable again.  

Finally, in the Last Mile and Digital S-Moving Startup category, Edgar Chandre Armengol, CEO of Washa Logistics SL, received the award for his project of urban warehouses and light electric vehicles, which solve problems in deliveries to the Horeca and food retail channel. Thus, helping to reduce emissions and congestion in cities.

The four winning applications will benefit from a training and mentoring programme by Startup Europe Accelerator to access European funds (LIFE, EIT, among others), legal advice, networking and international communication, in particular.

Promoting sustainable entrepreneurship

The Startup Europe Awards are an initiative promoted by the European Commission and implemented by the Finnova Foundation in collaboration with Startup Europe Accelerator. Startup Europe Awards (SEUA) is the open innovation methodology of public-private collaboration that was created in 2016 and promotes the identification of innovative solutions by entrepreneurs to SDG and EU challenges. The process fosters collaboration between the different actors in the entrepreneurial ecosystem and aims to accelerate companies through the tools and mechanisms offered by the EU. These tools and mechanisms are networking and access to investors, training in EU legislation and funds, and mentoring to turn the idea into a real demonstration project such as Horizon Europe or Life, subsidised by the EU with up to €5 million per project.

The aim of the Greencities & S-Moving Startup Europe Awards is to promote sustainable entrepreneurship in the field of circular economy, sustainability, mobility and the fight against Climate Change in an urban environment. 

The Greencities & S-Moving Startup Europe Awards had 4 categories:

• Municipal Waste To Energy: best startup with a project in waste management for energy production such as biogas, green hydrogen (pyrolysis, thermocracking, etc) excluding incineration.

• Greencities and la Nueva Bauhaus: best startup with a project that responds to the phenomenon of heat islands in cities with disruptive solutions that redesign the green use of the fifth façade and verticals. 

• S-Moving: best startup that addresses the challenges of decarbonised and more efficient mobility in cities. 

• Last Mile and Digital S-Moving Startup: best startup with a digital project that helps the development of a smart city. 

About the Finnova Foundation

Finnova is the European foundation, of Spanish-Belgian origin, that helps finance innovation and seeks to promote public-private cooperation through the transfer of the best available low-cost technological solutions. Its aim is to address social challenges such as employment, entrepreneurship, the UN SDGs, the circular economy, waste recovery, sustainable tourism, and the fight against climate change. It is present in Spain in the Valencian Community, the Basque Country, Andalusia, the Community of Madrid, Extremadura, and the Canary Islands, where it promotes green jobs, economic recovery, training, and youth employment.