Last week a great representation of TCI members met in Brussels at the 9th European Cluster Conference, organised by the ECCP, European Cluster Collaboration Platform, a body under the European Commission.

The event took place on 7-8 May bringing together more than 900 cluster experts from over 40 countries, to discuss what cluster policy is needed to make Europe a world leader in priority topics such as green and digital transitions and resilience building - providing a deep dive into key drivers like skills, funding, and technology.

Many of the TCI Network members took the opportunity to participate in inspiring workshops, fruitful meetings and, excellent options for networking. With us, we brought new future collaborations for innovation and growth in Europe and beyond.

“Amazing gathering of Europen clusters from all EU corners! 6 from Emilia-Romagna taking advantage of workshops, bilateral meetings and networking! Food for thougthts and for future collaborations for of European growth. And a great opportunity for meeting the many TCI friends attending the event.” Valeria Bandini, ART-ER the Emilia-Romagna Clust-ER Networks.

“Russia‘s war in Ukraine has significantly changed EU policy priorities and ongoing discussions on a new European Defence Industrial strategy are very likely to enter the debate on the role of clusters in regional industrial transition, innovation and competitiveness soon.” Oliver Ziegler, VDI/VDE Innovation + Technik.

Our main takeaways

1️⃣📣 The conference marked a milestone; indeed the European clusters are growing in scale and impact. Touching, impressive and a potential not to miss out on. Hence, the conference also highlighted new challenges to work in a changed geopolitical setting where especially Russia‘s war in Ukraine has significantly changed priorities.

2️⃣💰 To fully harvest the huge investments - and in general this is more the people involved to make it work (than the actual funding) - then even more strategic thinking is needed with even more engagement of the broader eco-system at all levels - also globally.

3️⃣🏹 So we need to look ahead, look more transversal across sectors and with a more mission driven approach to tackles the more and more complex challenges the clusters are responding to.

4️⃣🔬 On this journey we need to keep measuring impact and evaluate the value of clusters and how they support the difficult transitions societies and industries are going through. Then us - cluster believers - can better explain about clusters and their value.

5️⃣🚀 On this journey we also need to ensure we have all hands on deck and include all. Hence core topics like inclusiveness and sustainability is just growing and all kind of cluster eco-systems needs to respond - and in some cases also be helped to board the journey.

How we support this journey in TCI Network

In TCI we try to support this journey through our different activities. In the framework the TCI Cluster Accelerator Program we offer best practise and mentoring the help the transition and change needed. For the TCI Cluster Policy Workshop 2024 in Linz we will focus on how to update and change cluster policies to the global challenges. While for the 27th TCI Global Conference in Chihuahua, Mexico, challenges on AI, human progress and mission driven approaches will be a core.

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