During the Europe2020 summit, held in Brussels on last May 22nd 2014, the new program Start-up Europe Partnership (SEP) was officially presented. Such programs’ purpose is the development and growth of the start-up made in UE. The program, coordinated by the Italian-American foundation “Mind the Bridge”, supported by the English foundation for innovation “Nesta” and by the campus for start-up and tech-companies with head office in Berlin “The Factory”, has the purpose to aid the new companies to acquire market at a global level, supporting the so-called economical-industrial scale up of the same start-up born in the field of new technologies and equipped with a sufficient professional background in order to try the international scale up.

The mentioned program builds on the data coming from the real market, under which the old continent sees its companies in a state of deep inferiority compared to those related to the US system. In order to fill this existing gap, in the past years the European Commission launched the action plan “Entrepreneurship 2020 Action Plan” and the SEP, presented in recent days, which fits precisely in the range of measures provided by the same European authority. The goals set in the more general plan “Start-up Europe” provide, in fact, for the achievement of a better connection between different subjects of the entrepreneurial landscape with the purpose to help the growth of the new companies. Always in order to promote the internalisation, there are programs, as the one in the present study, that promote the economical development of the new companies facilitating access to funds both private and European - in this regard, it is remarkable the funding program Horizon2020 – and, in the end, with the intent to inspire investors and the creators the major European authorities present a model example of entrepreneurship.

In particular, the SEP has been introduced to implement the manifesto of start-ups, which has as its objectives the strengthening of the necessary training in the field of digital and of the skills among the young entrepreneurs, the widening of the entrance of talent and the maintenance of the existing ones, the facilitating access to capital and, finally, the modernization of the policy data, data protection and privacy.

In view of the above reference, as clarified by the same foundation Chairman, Alberto Onetti, the platform coordinated by Mind the Bridge has been created with the purpose of “supporting the growth of the best European start-ups” through the activities of matching, mapping and sharing. The idea is to create a number of events involving on one hand the start-ups and on the other hand large companies and other potential investors. The meeting of these two reality – the matching -, the free speaking between them, always coordinated and facilitated by the European institution experts, represents an opportunity to promote the ideas, as well as potential development and industrialization of the same.

The second major activity provided by SEP is the so called mapping of the success start-ups mapping.TheCommission intends to monitor the ongoing projects publishing and promoting the story of the small enterprises that have been able to grow up and enter into the global market, so as to encourage others to open to intentional investors. Also this attention to the geographic distribution of the start-ups on the European territory will allow the European institutions to monitor the program implementation into the different member States and to adopt, where appropriate, incentives and targeted operations in order to balance the differences existing between the various Countries.

In the end, always with a view to align the aforementioned economic and industrial development between the European States and to reduce the existing cultural discrepancies, SEP promotes the sharing, that is the activity in which the successful start-ups will put their knowledge and skills acquired at the disposal of the “colleagues” wishing to internationalize and challenge themselves in the international market, telling them their best practices that have allowed the first ones to become leaders inside the global economic landscape.

This deep cooperation and collaboration between the different players of the market will bring, at least in the idea of the Commission, to the industrial development of the European technological start-ups which, through a long process of industrialization, supported even economically by the European institutions, could arrive to compete with the major overseas competitors reducing the gap that characterizes the current situation and who sees a very small number of companies belonging to the old continent as industry’s leaders compared to numerous U.S. colleagues. In addition, the Vice President of the European Commission, also responsible for the Digital Agenda, during the summit Europe2020 highlighted that start-ups are able to innovate and create jobs like no other, so helping them to compete in the global market, “breaking the glass that separates them from success” would give a boost to the stagnant economy, even in order to create a more rapid and robust economic upturn.

Avv. Nicolino Gentile Dott.ssa Federica Baccigalupi