The European Urban Initiative – Innovative Actions is proud to announce its second Call for Proposals, with an indicative budget of EUR 120 millions from the European Regional Development Fund. The call is a golden opportunity for innovative projects that align with three crucial topics, listed below.

In a forward-looking move, the European Commission adopted the New European Innovation Agenda in July 2022. It plans to position Europe as a global innovation leader, particularly in the realm of deep tech innovation and startups. Deep-tech innovation, rooted in cutting-edge science, technology, and engineering, holds the potential to offer transformative solutions to global challenges. Especially by combining advances in the physical, biological, and digital domains.

As the world embraces the challenges of sustainability and environmental consciousness, innovation procurement emerges as a powerful tool. It can make cities stronger in leading the change towards a greener and more sustainable future. In this article, we showcase three inspiring case stories. They exemplify the transformative power of innovation procurement in driving positive change across urban landscapes.

If you follow the BUILD project, you might have captured how powerful innovation procurement can be. Especially when targeting societal, environmental and economic challenges. The victory comes, when innovative solutions that are not yet available or do not exist, reach the market to solve the issues. Such a practice goes beyond conventional procurement. Mainly by emphasizing collaboration, risk-sharing, and the stimulation of innovation within industries.

In the world of innovation procurement, collaboration and synergy play a crucial role in driving progress and positive change. One of the key elements that fosters this process is the concept of multipliers – diverse groups of key players working together to amplify the impact of innovation initiatives.

The recent joint webinar organized by the BUILD Project and the Innovation Procurement Task Force brought together procurement professionals and stakeholders. They met to explore the realm of innovation procurement. The webinar aimed at addressing challenges, sharing insights, and providing participants with valuable resources to navigate the landscape of procurement for innovation successfully. In this article, you will find the main key resources shared during the event that can empower organizations in their innovation procurement endeavours.

Innovation procurement has emerged as a powerful tool to address pressing environmental, urban, and societal challenges. By strategically adopting this approach, many countries across Europe have witnessed remarkable improvements. In this article, we would like to showcase the benefits of Innovation Procurement through practical cases. All of them are based on our BUILD’s partner countries’ experiences from Estonia, Finland, and the Netherlands. They could help you have a clearer idea of what the meaning of “innovation” really is, and to brainstorm some ideas for your city as well!

Public Procurement of Innovation (PPI) plays a vital role in driving technological advancements and fostering innovation within the public sector. However, to achieve effective and efficient outcomes, it is essential to identify and address the challenges associated with PPI. 

The circular economy is key to solving Europe’s waste crisis. As well as the rising cost of new materials by reducing the use of raw materials, and closing loops in different productive sectors. By creating a circular system with less pressure on virgin resources, direct and indirect negative environmental impacts will be decreased while creating an efficient economy and opportunities for healthy growth and innovation.