Urban M Interreg Europe

Project Led By:

BCU initiated the project and was the lead partner due to its successful maker space, STEAMhouse.

Type of Project:

Collaborative Research

Launch Date:

2017

Completed or Ongoing:

Project Complete in 2022

Project Summary:

The Birmingham City University-led Urban Manufacturing project concluded after five years of collaborative research. It has helped a number of major European regions to improve their innovation offering and better support collaborative spaces, SMEs and students.

It also firmly put STEAMhouse on the map as the Urban M project culminated in the European partners visiting the University’s new STEAMhouse building, observing the centre’s state-of-the-art facilities and learning from our experience.

Audience:

This project was devised to develop and support collaborative maker spaces, areas designated for collaborative making, learning and sharing.

Project Collaboration:

As well as BCU and Birmingham City Council, Urban M brought together a number of partners from across Europe, including:

City of Bratislava (Slovakia)
Vilnius City Administration (Lithuania)
Lisbon City Council (Portugal)
Fomento San Sebastian, Economic Development Agency (Spain)
Lazio Region (Italy)
City of Zagreb (Croatia)
Kranj BSC (Slovenia)

These partners were brought together in order to exchange knowledge, build their innovation ecosystems and in turn help maker spaces in their area to grow.

Project Goals:

To investigate cities’ challenges and use this research to produce an individual action plan to change local policy and better support maker spaces.

Benefits of the Project:

Over the course of the project’s five-year timespan, a number of the cities involved have introduced impactful new measures that will ensure maker spaces, and innovation in general, can thrive.

Examples include:

Zagreb has secured additional funding from the programme for a pilot project and launched the Makers’ Community Hub at the Nicola Tesla Museum ,. This has hosted a number of successful workshops with over 150 participants, with the support of local universities, organisations and other maker spaces. It has also implemented a new programme to help support the development of SMEs, new activities for coworking and maker spaces, and a public call for grants for innovators.
Lazio has created micro-innovation labs to support entrepreneurs, startups and SMEs in the region. These labs offer a stimulating environment for new projects to be developed, support SMEs in understanding and utilising the latest tech, and offer a space for startups to respond to the innovation needs of businesses.
San Sebastian has enhanced and strengthened their Donostia Innovation Campus, which now offers a set of established programmes for students on subjects such as innovation and business management.
Leading educational centres and businesses were also involved and they have seen over 400 students take part in different activities to bolster their skills in innovation, collaboration and the latest technologies.

Project Events/Research:

Study visits to the partner cities
An international conference, held in Bratislava in 2019.
Design thinking workshops to help cities identify the policies and initiatives they wanted to change and how they could achieve this.
A handbook to support other cities in developing policies to support their maker spaces.

Project Feedback (if completed):

“A great deal of inspiration has come from what we have learned on this project”

says Xabier Hualde from Fomento San Sebastian.

“Institutions such as STEAMhouse have made possible a strategic approach and knowledge transfer that has helped us to polish our strategy.”

Laura Veart, BCU’s Interreg Europe Project Manager for Urban M, is pleased with the progress and positive impact that the project has had.

“By bringing together cities across Europe, there has been an inspiring and impactful exchange of ideas, plans and knowledge.”

“We have learnt from one another and, collaboratively, have helped to introduce vital new policies that will help maker spaces, creatives, SMEs and practitioners thrive.”

“One of the big benefits of Urban M has been taking local stakeholders, such as the Greater Birmingham Chamber of Commerce and the Local Enterprise Partnership, to see what’s been achieved in other cities and coming back to consider what could be accomplished in Birmingham.”

“The project has given us a real opportunity to put STEAMhouse on the European map.”

Laura Veart, BCU’s Interreg Europe Project Manager for Urban M