Participants from 8 countries attended the DEVISE project kick-off meeting in Sofia on 26 June 2018. Bulgarian partner, the Business Association Agency hosted the meeting. This first meeting served as a 'capacity building' event to prepare the partnership to set up, manage and monitor the processes at the core of the project.
The meeting began with each partner making a short presentation about their organisation. Further, project management, coordination of activities and communication and dissemination responsibilities were discussed.
The next steps for DEVISE partners are the preparation of the good practices package and to establish the regional stakeholder groups in their regions. Stakeholders are foreseen as a key actor to be involved in the project activities in order to get their support for the development and implementation of the action plans.
About DEVISE
DEVISE, co-funded by the European Union through the Interreg Europe programme, is a 4-year project led by ERNACT bringing together partners from Ireland, Romania, Spain, Bulgaria, Finland, United Kingdom, France and Belgium. The project aims to give a response to the current challenge that these European regions are facing, to unlock and exploit the potential that digital tech SMEs have as enabler for the competitiveness of other SMEs belonging to sectors included in their Regional Smart Specialisation Strategies (RIS3).