START-UP INCUBATOR

New electro-mobility solutions are a key element for the implementation of the Paris Agreement, the Sustainable Development Goals and the New Urban Agenda. To develop those innovative and integrated solutions, cooperation between cities worldwide, industry and innovators is key. To this end, SOLUTIONSplus has established the SOLUTIONSplus Start-up incubator. Led by ERTICO in close cooperation with FIER, and benefitting from the experience gathered by the ERTICO Start-ups initiative and its “Connect. Innovate. Grow.” approach:

Connect: focuses on “fit-for-use”, connecting SMEs and start-ups with relevant stakeholders to make sure strategic partnership and cooperation can be set in place, and identifies the supporting incubator actions to assure on-time and quality deliveries;
Innovate: focuses on key services offered by the incubator. Such as building competence, expertise and knowledge optimisation, improving business intelligence, focussed marketing, and dissemination;
Grow: focuses on business development and scaling up (both geographical and in terms of portfolio). 

Thanks to this approach, the SOLUTIONSplus start-up incubator offers a unique opportunity for collaboration with start-ups, SMEs and industry partners to co-develop e-mobility solutions that can generate economic opportunities across different regions, Africa, Asia and Latin America, and, of course, Europe. More concretely, the SOLUTIONSplus Start-up incubator provides seed funding and guidance to 13 start-ups that participate in nine demonstrations happening in different cities in Africa, Asia and Latin America. 

The support for local innovators goes well beyond funding, and includes also: 

1. Support in drafting their SOLUTIONSplus business plans; 

2. Local hackathons and start-up events to strengthen the partnership between local companies with European innovators and industry partners; 

3. Opportunities for project partners to act as customers for the services and the products of identified start-ups, or to act as (co-)investors in these start-ups; 

4. Scale up opportunities and replication of business models to increase their potential revenue basis after the end of the project;

5. Renewed business plans with potential scale-up and investment opportunity;

6. Dedicated trainings.

By engaging with and bringing together highly committed cities, industry, research institutes, implementing organisations and finance partners, SMEs and start-ups, SOLUTIONSplus enables cooperation and innovation by establishing a global platform for shared, public and commercial e-mobility solutions to kick start the transition towards low-carbon urban mobility worldwide.