Venture capital investment and the technology entrepreneurship ecosystem. The innovation ecosystem is a key factor in the success of “growing” a small venture company Track “Projects and Technologies”

We use this term many times, we need to decipher what we mean by it. It contains two key words: “innovative” and “eco-system”. From the definition of an ecosystem we will isolate the most important properties:

Ecosystem - complex (according to the definition of complex systems by L. Bertalanffy) self-organizing, self-regulating and self-developing system. The main characteristic of an ecosystem is the presence of relatively closed, spatially and temporally stable flows of matter and energy between the biotic and abiotic parts of the ecosystem. An ecosystem is an open system and is characterized by input and output flows of matter and energy.

Thus, by innovative eco-system we will understand self-organizing, self-regulating and self-developing, open a system characterized by input flows of ideas, value, people, information, resources. In this sense, an innovative ecosystem is an example of an economy in which specific subjects of economic and social relations operate. The difference between an innovation ecosystem (IES) is that it produces innovations, ideas, intellectual property and people for society and other industries, which in return provide the IES with problems and requests, as well as resources for self-development. The IES cannot exist without the global economy, since it is from it that the demand for innovation and change comes, and the global economy without the IES is doomed to stagnation and degradation, because the IES accumulates a key creative resource.

The core of the IES are innovators - those who create, develop and promote innovation based on their own motivations or on the basis of demand. It is innovators and entrepreneurs who are the core of the IES; it is they who create meaning and set the entire IES in motion. In addition to innovators, the IEC includes various agents who help innovators - specialists, investors, corporations and funds that finance innovation. However, the leading role belongs to the creators, because even if there is a huge demand, in order to transform it into action, a person is needed who will take the initiative, because demand is always latent, and supply is active and can only come from a specific person, since nothing but individuals and the communities they create do not exist on the planet, and the creative creative function is inherent only in man, and not in the abstract, but in the concrete. This is very important, because you cannot force a person to create changes, you can only create motivation and prerequisites. Thus, innovators, entrepreneurs, are those who absorb problems and opportunities and come up with ideas. In addition to innovators, the IES has specialists who help the entrepreneur implement ideas, investors and providers of various resources. Ultimately, innovators, specialists and providers of money and services generate a flow of innovations that society perceives, evaluates, and pays for. At the same time, society, a developing society, generates problems and, therefore, a demand for innovation in the broadest sense, paying for it through corporations and other institutions. On the other hand, innovators themselves create innovations and thereby create new demand. Therefore, there are two flows that support the IES - the flow of innovation and the flow of demand for innovation. Accordingly, all participants in the IES can be divided into two categories - those who create demand for innovation and those who create innovation themselves.

This map shows how money for R&D moves from the state through large companies

This diagram shows how ideas, startups and money move

INNOVATION MANAGEMENT

Having studied the material in Section I, the student must:

know

• conceptual and categorical apparatus of innovation management;
• professional requirements for an innovative leader;

be able to

• identify and classify innovations according to various characteristics and criteria;
• carry out strategic planning of innovation activities;
• choose the necessary methods of diversification of activities;

own

• the main methods of stimulating lower management and employees;
• modern technologies for organizing the management of innovative projects and assessing their effectiveness;
• specifics of drawing up the main sections of a business plan.

INNOVATION ECOSYSTEM

Conceptual apparatus: national innovation system; innovation ecosystem; small and medium enterprises; microenterprise; simplified taxation system; accelerated depreciation; life cycle of the company; growth dilemma; business incubators; technology parks; business accelerators; start-up capital; startups; venture capital firms; venture fund; technology transfer.

Concept of innovation ecosystem

Recently, in television and print media, as well as at major events dedicated to the issues of innovative development, the expression “innovation ecosystem” is increasingly heard. This term is relatively young and has not yet had time to firmly enter scientific and everyday circulation, but it has a solid foundation. It describes a modern model of innovative development of the economy of a region or country and is essentially an up-to-date version of earlier concepts, the first and main of which is the theory national innovation system (NIS), formed at the turn of the 80s and 90s. XX century

The term “innovation system” was first used by the Danish economist B.-A. Lundvall, a little later, described it as “elements and connections between them that interact in the production, dissemination and use of economically useful (economically in demand) knowledge,” and the national aspect is emphasized by the fact that “these elements are located within national borders.”

R. Nelson (1993) succeeded in concretizing and clarifying this definition (especially in terms of the criteria for the economic usefulness of knowledge), who interprets the concept of NIS as a system of national institutions, whose interaction determines the effectiveness of the innovative activities of national firms.

Finally, in 1995, S. Metcalfe proposed another definition of IPR, in which he tried to generalize and summarize all the ideas about this phenomenon that were available at that time. Thus, he views the NIS as “a set of various institutions that jointly or separately contribute to the development and transfer of technologies, as well as providing the framework within which the state forms a policy to influence the innovation process,” or as “a system of various interrelated institutions that produce, store and transferring knowledge, skills and created products used in the development of new technologies."

In table 1.1 provides modern definitions of NIS, given by a number of domestic authors.

Table 1.1

Any NIS is built by the common efforts of the state (through legislation implementing certain macroeconomic policies), the scientific sphere (fundamental research and training of research personnel) and the business environment (applied research, commercialization of technologies, production and marketing of innovative products).

Thus, the country’s innovation system consists of four subsystems, or macroblocks:

• 1) state;
• 2) business environment;
• 3) environment that produces knowledge;
• 4) mechanisms for knowledge transfer.

In each of the blocks, for the sake of convenience of analysis, the constituent components are additionally identified, for example, the block “mechanisms for knowledge transfer” can be divided into two elements: diffusion (distribution) of technologies and the educational process.

The NIS structure often also includes:

• meta-institutions, which, in addition to legislation, include the culture, history and customs of the country, which form the general climate for the functioning of all elements of the system, including those influencing the features of macroeconomic policy;
• market in a broad sense, which, on the one hand, creates conditions and resources for the production of knowledge and innovation (labor and capital markets), and on the other, creates demand for new products and, indirectly, for innovation.

The construction of the NIS of any country makes it possible to find “bottlenecks” that hinder the innovative development of the economy. Nevertheless, many scientists agree that the NIS model, based on a rigid hierarchy of constituent elements and the linearity of their interaction, is outdated and does not reflect modern processes occurring in the innovation sphere.

Concept innovation ecosystem (innovation ecosystem) was proposed by C. Wessner in 2004, although the term “ecosystem”, borrowed from the natural sciences, began to be used in relation to economic and social phenomena much earlier. Thus, it can be traced that back in 1996 J. (0. Moore formulated the idea entrepreneurial ecosystem (business ecosystem), which includes companies and the networks they form of suppliers, market intermediaries, consumers and competitors. The author argues that relationships between companies are built similarly to an ecosystem in nature, and with the help of interaction (even if the companies are not partners, but competitors) one can achieve greater results than individually.

The ideas of J.F. Moore contributed to the further expansion of the concept of ecosystems to narrower areas of entrepreneurship. For example, it was described digital business ecosystem (digital business ecosystem), which is essentially an integral part of the entrepreneurial ecosystem. Currently, there is often talk about the creation by large international companies and transnational corporations (TNCs), especially those specializing in the production of computers and software, of an ecosystem of their products that harmoniously complement each other and, when used together, bring additional convenience to the consumer. From a company's point of view, the formation of a product ecosystem means increased attractiveness of products in the eyes of consumers, new savings opportunities (a single advertising concept is used, products are designed for sharing and, therefore, a single target audience), increased brand loyalty and additional deterrents from switching for competitors' products.

Example

A good example is the device ecosystem Apple : When sharing a smartphone iPhone, player iPod, tablet iPad (they all run on the operating system iOS ) and computers Mac you can maintain a single list of contacts, synchronize photos between devices via a cloud service iCloud download the same applications and music tracks purchased from a digital store only once onto these devices, as well as use convenient services for communication ( iMessage And FaceTime ) provided that the interlocutors also use devices Apple. With the appearance in iOS 8 and operating system for laptops OS X Yosemite features Continuity Users will be able to start working on one device and immediately continue it on another. We strive to create such a system of devices and software products that is self-sufficient from the user’s point of view. Microsoft, started producing tablets Surface on Windows 8 and developing a mobile version of its operating system (used, for example, in the family of smartphones Nokia Lumia).

According to G. G. Vinberg’s definition, ecosystem (from Greek oikos – dwelling, place of residence) is a natural complex formed by living organisms and their habitat (soil, reservoir, etc.), interconnected by metabolism and energy.

Ecosystem of innovation– an environment formed directly by the participants in the innovation process, in which their interaction takes place, aimed at the creation and development of innovations.

The collection of articles “Venture Investments and the Ecosystem of Technological Entrepreneurship” published by the Russian Venture Company (RVC) provides the following definition of an innovation ecosystem: “... a complex interconnected system of organizations of various forms of ownership, government institutions, legislative and other incentives, social relations, services and practices , within which the process of transforming innovative engineering ideas into successful high-tech companies is carried out in the most effective way." It is also clarified here that “the commercialization of knowledge most successfully occurs in a favorable supportive environment, which is usually called the venture investment ecosystem.”

Innovation Ecosystem (IES) can be defined as a community (or network community) that acts as a catalyst for the interaction of participants for the transformation, exchange, dissemination and effective distribution of knowledge and other resources.

In this sense, one of the main goals of the IES as a community is to organize cooperation between participants in the innovation process, during which agents who do not individually have sufficient resources, due to the complementarity of the latter, achieve common goals.

Ch. Wessner sees the linearity of the traditional model of the innovation system - NIS - in the fact that innovation activity in it appears as a unidirectional process. It appears that increased public and private investment in scientific research will automatically increase a country's success in commercializing technology and, therefore, national competitiveness in the global marketplace (Figure 1.1).

In reality, it is impossible to clearly separate fundamental research from applied research. These processes are closely interrelated, and at the development stage there is a possibility of spontaneously finding new areas of application. In addition, many discoveries are made by trial and error, which also makes the process nonlinear and presupposes the presence of feedback at every stage. It is due to the feedback effect that the internal development of each link and the entire system as a whole occurs (Fig. 1.2).

Based on the above, we can formulate the main properties of the innovation ecosystem:

• 1) a high degree of self-organization (the ability to maintain “order” during spontaneous, local interactions, i.e. without a clear leader);
• 2) decentralized method of decision making;
• 3) cooperation and mutual assistance of participants regardless of their status and capabilities;
• 4) co-evolution (mutual development of subjects in the course of their interaction);
• 5) adaptability (adaptation to a changing external environment through internal changes);
• 6) emergence (the presence of integrity properties in a system, i.e. properties that are not inherent in its constituent elements).

Recently, the joint use of the economic categories “innovation”, “entrepreneurship” and the biological category “ecosystem” has become widespread not only in the West, but also in Russia. Today we hear the phrases “entrepreneurial ecosystem” and “innovation ecosystem” more and more often. James Moore coined the term business ecosystem in 1993, since which time the term “entrepreneurial/innovation ecosystem” has become widespread in the European scientific and business communities. This term entered Russian business circulation relatively recently, and there is still no single definition for it. In this regard, first of all, it seems appropriate to determine the essence of these concepts.

Of particular note is Deborah Jackson's What is an Innovation Ecosystem, in which she notes that an innovation ecosystem is a dynamic economic model of complex relationships that are formed between participants or organizations whose functional purpose is to develop technology and innovation. In his view, the innovation ecosystem model consists of two different types of economies: a research economy, driven by basic research, and a commercial economy, driven by the market. An innovation ecosystem is healthy when the resources invested in the research economy (through private, public or direct investment) are further translated into profit-generating innovations that are reflected in the commercial economy. At this point, the two economies (research and commercial) exist in a balanced equilibrium. When the profit received from the commercialization of innovations exceeds the investment in R&D, the innovation ecosystem grows. More efficient functioning is facilitated by the presence of a developed infrastructure and a culture of entrepreneurship. In his work, D. Jackson emphasizes the high importance of conducting research and generating innovation, which is one of the tasks of modern universities.

Professor Daniel Eisenberg, founder and executive director of the Babson Entrepreneurship Ecosystem Project - BEEP, notes that there are six key lessons to consider to build an effective entrepreneurial ecosystem:

1) it is necessary to understand and comprehensively develop all elements of the entrepreneurial ecosystem, as shown in the figure: policies; financial industry; culture; infrastructure that supports entrepreneurship; human capital (including education); market. He gives the example that financing without education and culture will not lead to entrepreneurship. It is necessary to take into account all these elements and their mutual influence on each other;

Ecology of life: I was personally interested in understanding how it happened that a country traditionally famous for its large corporations Shell, Philips, DAF, etc. quickly became one of the places where a large number of startups are generated, a significant proportion of which become significant technology companies

I personally was interested in understanding how it happened that a country traditionally famous for its large corporations Shell, Philips, DAF, etc. quickly became one of the places where a large number of startups are generated, a significant proportion of which become significant technology companies. After most of the corporations began to have big problems, which was accompanied by layoffs of tens of thousands of people, this country was able to quickly rebuild, focusing on the development of an innovation ecosystem according to the “Triple Helix” model (as the interaction between Business-Science-Government is now called).

It is immediately noticeable that the Dutch live very well - the price level is higher than the European average, possibly at the level of the Scandinavian countries. Almost everywhere there is free access to WiFi. At the same time, it is not customary to boast about wealth - there are very few expensive cars. And in general, there are few cars on the roads - mostly the Dutch travel on bicycles. When we were in Eindhoven, the organizer of the trip from the Dutch side, Pim van Geist, talked about how the Dutch like it when work is a little further from home, so that instead of charging, they can ride their bike at a leisurely pace for 15-30 minutes every morning. Despite the fact that there are no traffic jams at all, it is even faster to travel short distances on bicycles - there are dedicated bicycle paths for them everywhere. So we moved around Eindhoven on bicycles.

Eindhoven is the birthplace of Philips. Although it’s probably not entirely correct to say this, because when in 1890 Anton Philips’s elder brother (who actually became the founder of the technology company a little later in 1895) decided to organize textile production here, Eindhoven was just a village. By 1900, 5,000 people already lived here, and by this time the Philips company was already actively engaged in breakthrough technologies in lighting. In 2000, the population of Eindhoven was already 200,000 people. It was the Philips corporation that played a key role in the development of the city.

By the way, at the Philips Museum we were told that the first major transaction was the sale in 1898 of 50,000 light bulbs (an incredible number at that time) to the Winter Palace in St. Petersburg. It is believed that it was after this that the company began to develop rapidly, earning a lot of money, and most importantly, gaining widespread worldwide fame and PR based on such an order.
I remember the statement of Anton Philips, who in 1950 said: “What we need are people with imagination.”

By the way, according to one of our interlocutors, Phillips began to lose ground precisely from the moment when the corporation’s management began to pay more attention to the current value of shares than to innovative development. Philips began to take less risks, developing something completely new and breakthrough. At the same time, it was already more difficult for creative people to realize themselves in Philips.

For example, in the late 1990s, Philips did not finance the development of a device that would allow you to have all the music that exists with you. For two whole years, a certain Tony Feidl, an employee of Philips (one of the “man with imagination”), tried to achieve the implementation of the project, after which he left across the ocean, and after a short period of time, Steve Jobs had already presented the iPod to the whole world, which changed the music industry.

Philips made many spin-off companies, thanks to which such as, for example, the company ASML, created in 1984, appeared - now it is already a corporation that has already outgrown Philips in value. Nikolai Stepanenko, senior manager for strategic sourcing at ASML, enthusiastically talks about how rapidly they are growing, what grandiose plans they have for many years to come. The company is one of the world leaders in chip production - sales in 2014 amounted to 6 billion euros, the company employs about 14,000 people (very soon they will overtake Philips in this indicator). At the same time, the company invested more than 1 billion of its revenue in R&D. In parallel, the company is developing the direction of new light sources, lithography. Nikolai says with regret that there are a lot of Russians in Eindhoven, and that it is more difficult to realize oneself in Russia.

His words are confirmed by Alexander Dolgov, who worked in the ASML-Research laboratories on his second dissertation (Alexander received his first PhD degree at the Institute of Spectroscopy of the Russian Academy of Sciences). Today he is the industrial representative of Rusnano in the European scientific and industrial consortium for thin-film photovoltaics Solliance: “Today there is all the necessary equipment and conditions for implementing a technological breakthrough in the field of integration of photovoltaic technologies into our usual production (automotive, construction and even clothing) in Russia This is still difficult.”

ASML is partly located in HTC Eindhoven - this is just a huge area where the Philips R&D center used to be. Now HTC employs over 10,000 people, more than 135 companies, including Philips. Previously, access here was only possible by prior arrangement, but now there are no restrictions, and the premises are filled with various technology companies and research centers.

It is worth noting that the conversation took place in the Solliance premises. This consortium brings together R&D organizations from the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany with large international industrial companies (Thyssenkrupp, Roth&Rau, VDL). Here, science and business work together to develop technologies for thin-film photovoltaic (TFPV) solutions. The scientific part of the alliance now unites 8 leading scientific institutes in Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands. Each of these institutes employs between 25 and 40 people at Solliance. Funds for research and prototyping are raised from various sources and distributed among scientific groups. Solliance's motto: “When you share, you get more.” This is another example of how the basic principle of the Open innovation system works. Partners share the products of intellectual work, develop a common strategy for an innovative breakthrough, share risks in order to then share excess profits. A principle that is so far only in very rare cases implemented within our country.

The Startupbootcamp HighTechXL accelerator is also located here at the High Tech Campus Eindhoven.

The accelerator was named the best acceleration platform in Europe according to the European Bus 2014 competition. The accelerator works with projects in the areas of Internet of Things, new materials, robotics, energy efficiency, 3D printing, Cleantech, MedTech. 2 sets are made per year, the program lasts 3 months. Of the 21 graduates, 13 are foreign startups, so the program is conducted in English (fortunately, in the Netherlands, almost everyone speaks English). At the entrance thanks to the brand (just look at thisfantastic with statistics accelerators Startupbootcamp) they manage to create a large pipeline of projects (more than 1000 applications), they select the best 100 projects that come to Eindhoven and work for 4 days with experts from large corporations and mentors from business. Based on the results, the 10 best projects are selected for the accelerator, where they work on the startup’s business model.

According to the co-founder of the accelerator, Eric Brockusen, for the remaining 90 projects that came for the final selection, participation in this 4-day expert session is of great benefit. The accelerator at the entrance buys an 8% share of startups for 15,000 euros. I remember that the accelerator has an agreement with the Faculty of Economics of a local university that students do internships helping startups analyze markets and prepare financial plans. There will be another recruitment soon - he says that there are Russian applications. When I asked how they manage to create one acceleration program for such different industries as medicine, the Internet of things and energy, Eric replied that the work is carried out mainly individually with the involvement of excellent industry experts and mentors - the ecosystem works.

At the Eindhoven municipality we were met by two nice girls who talked about the role of the state in the development of the city’s innovation ecosystem. By the way, Eindhoven ranks third in Europe in terms of direct investment volume after London and Helsinki.

They see the main role of the state in creating conditions for interaction between participants in the innovation process. The municipality helps organize a large number of events where scientists and entrepreneurs can meet in an informal setting, where students can hear about existing trends.
Here is the Eindhoven formula: “The ecosystem is shaped by people. Trust is needed for people to start interacting with each other. Our task is to increase the level of trust and develop the entrepreneurial spirit.”
In Eindhoven they relied on the BrainPort concept (think tank). The goal is to make Eindhoven the center of innovation in the Netherlands.

After Phillips laid off 40,000 people in Eindhoven, many buildings became empty.
At that moment, when entire buildings in which tens of thousands of Philips employees had previously worked began to become vacant and empty, the municipality decided to convert them into business incubators - to rent them out to entrepreneurs at low rates. The nondescript buildings were not remodeled; instead, they hired a well-known the designer who placed flower beds along the facades (Eindhoven is one of the European centers for the development of design - this is where, by the way, DDW Design Week takes place annually). The designers proposed making the roofs usable by planting plants and even small trees there. Thus, with minimal investments, an infrastructure suitable for being called a business incubator was created. By the way, now, as we were told, almost all the premises are occupied. Likewise, the Philips R&D center became the site for the High Tech Campus. The Dutch know how to use what they have without significant investment.

Throughout the trip, we constantly heard about the importance of trust in the formation of an ecosystem. I immediately remembered how an entrepreneur I know once expressed his opinion on the difference in doing business in Russia and Western Europe: “When you first begin to establish relationships with someone in Europe, initially, as a rule, they trust you; In Russia, initially no one trusts anyone, we need to earn trust.” By the way, it seemed to me that the Dutch mentality itself helps in building trusting relationships. At school, children sit in a semicircle, children are taught to listen carefully to the point of view of each classmate (it doesn’t matter, even if the child is retarded, his opinion is still important). Adults also like to discuss everything and listen to all points of view. The Dutch are quite straightforward and may even seem rude, but a low level of hypocrisy helps increase trust. The Dutch do not like hierarchy. It is customary for bosses to tell the whole truth and communicate as equals - the only difference is the level of responsibility and job responsibilities. An engineer can easily send an email to the president with some proposal and he, as a rule, will respond. When we were already in Twente talking with Kiis Eijkel, CEO, Kennispark Twente (a technology park from which more than 800 startups have emerged in 32 years, including such well-known ones as Booking.com), he said: “Every day I have to work like this, to prove to my team why I’m their leader, why I’m the boss here.”

Twente has a similar history to Eindhoven in terms of what sparked the development of an innovation ecosystem. Twente has historically had a strong textile industry. At the end of the 1950s, it became clear that the center of production was moving to Asia and Twente companies would no longer be able to compete in the global market. Then it was decided to create a technical university in the region (1962), which was supposed to create conditions for the emergence of new businesses to compensate for economic losses and the reduction of jobs. The University of Twente has developed a strong scientific base over the years, and in 1980 it became one of the first entrepreneurial universities - University 3.0. The city of Twente is twinned with the American Palo Alto from Silicon Valley.
Thus, there is a significant difference from the Eindhoven model, when the ecosystem was formed on the fragments of Philips and DAF, when there was a lot of talented engineering personnel, the task was to stimulate technological entrepreneurship. In Twente, in essence, an ecosystem was formed from scratch around the university.

Twente has all the necessary infrastructure for the development of a technology business - the Kennispark Twente science park, Saxion University of Applied Sciences, the academic center for entrepreneurship NIKOS (They have a 5-8 week course on technology entrepreneurship and innovation), pre-seed and seed venture funds (collaborating with Cottonwood Investments fund - one of the most successful early-stage funds, which helps the Dutch think like American venture capitalists “first think about the potential of the project, then about the risks” instead of the Dutch “first calculate the risks - then the potential of the project”), Proof of concepts Center...
The management of the Kennispark Twente science park participates in determining economic policy in the development of innovative activities (the basis for the development of the region according to their strategy). In 2005, they began to create an innovation platform in Twente, inviting university rectors, mayors of cities in the region, and representatives of innovation infrastructure. They managed to jointly develop a strategy for the region, based on a policy of trust.
How to convince people to share ideas? Building trust is important - it is a critical part of success. They see the main role of the state in creating an atmosphere of trust - this is the main task for them.
Twente strives to create a culture of profit not right now, but in 5-8 years. It is important to be able to work for the future.
Kiis Eijkel, in his brilliant presentation, says that it is time for Russia to move out of routine to the top of the triangle - it is in philosophy that we have problems, in a lack of understanding of the importance of relationships between people. He lived in Russia and knows how many creative people we have. It is necessary to create conditions for them, a general atmosphere for effective interaction with each other.

The mission of Twente Science Park is to support the innovation ecosystem. A business incubator on its own will not work - you need an ecosystem with a system of mentoring and support. Technological entrepreneurship requires a “Science – Entrepreneurship” link, while the weak link determines the effectiveness of the entire system.
There is a “Business Development Group” in the science park - their task is to visit institutes, departments and communicate with professors. The business development group looks at what developments can be used to build a business and only then helps create teams with the participation of entrepreneurs. They are trying to create interdisciplinary working groups. The task of the business development group is to create teams and develop businesses, and look for options to attract investment. However, the business development group must be independent, so group employees cannot have a stake in the projects. Business Development staff sign non-disclosure agreements even when meeting with students. Again, it’s still a question of trust and the importance of reputation.

The science park has its own system of financial support for projects. There is a university fund of 80 million euros, which issues loans to project initiators (as individuals). To get 10,000 euros you need an 8-slide presentation and a passionate person. At the 2nd stage, they lend another 40,000 euros for a written business plan. By the way, the loans are not at all preferential - 11% per annum. To my question that apparently the repayment rate of your loans is very low, Kiis replied that no - 97% are repaid. Of course, the project is often closed, but the initiators look for an opportunity, because reputation is more important. If money is really bad, they offer the startuper at least half of it back. Free money at the beginning of the construction journey is harmful - they believe in the Netherlands, you need to invest and start yourself, and you need to pay for mistakes in order to be better absorbed. At the same time, everything is decided at the level of human relations “in an amicable way,” without courts and police. Can you imagine it?

The science park hosts a lot of events to involve students in innovative activities, improve their competencies, and team building. In 2014, they organized 200 (!) events. Keyes says that there is a problem - recently, more and more professors are funded by large corporations (Uniliver, Shell, etc.), so professors are showing less and less interest in developing startups based on their developments.

The results of Kennispark Twente's activities since 1982 have been impressive: 8,000 high-tech jobs have been created, around 900 companies have been founded, and the companies that have received support tend to remain in the region. Those who leave still provide support to the ecosystem - this is how the founder of Booking.com often comes to Twente - helps teams as a mentor, invests. By the way, Booking.com is now more expensive than Philips.

It was interesting to meet Yuri Udalov - CTO of the EyeOnAir project. He is an expert in the field of spectroscopy of mobile materials. As part of the project, they are making devices for detecting inhomogeneities. He says that from September 1, a new rule will be introduced at European airports - it will be necessary to randomly check 20% of passengers for explosive residues on their hands and clothes. He is targeting this market. At first, a certain banker believed in the project team, investing 150,000, later one of the funds invested in them, estimating 3.5 million euros.
Yuri looks like an ordinary Russian scientist, but expresses his thoughts very directly - apparently he has already been saturated with local culture for 25 years.

His story is interesting, how he came from science to technology business. In 1990, he left Moscow on an exchange trip to the University of Twente and “got stuck,” as he says. I worked at the university for a long time, doing scientific work. They had a group of Russian scientists in Twente led by Professor Ochkin. In 2005, he and a friend thought that they needed to do something interesting, otherwise “they would have written on our grave - they worked in Professor Ochkin’s working group. And that’s it.” They decided to leave the university and make a business out of their knowledge. Founded the company Stirel (now the parent company of the enxray project). Yuri gratefully says that without the University of Twente nothing would have happened - they helped to come into contact with the right people to develop the business. By the way, in our country, a scientist who leaves the team with the desire to build a business on scientific developments in most universities (well, not in all of them) becomes an “enemy of the people.” No one will help him with the university infrastructure; they will rather interfere. That's the difference. By the way, Yuri promised to apply to the AeroSpace track of the GenerationS accelerator. We really count on this.

Science Park Utrecht (45 minutes from Amsterdam) is a center for the development of Life Sciences & Health and Sustainability (the science of life and the sustainability of natural systems). The state will invest 1.2 billion euros in the construction and equipment of the center in the next 2 years, then another 1 billion. Their goal is to become a European leader in Life Sciences & Health, creating 5,000 jobs by 2018.

Already now they have something to be proud of - they employ a famous scientist known for stem cell research, a local company that is working on cancer treatment will soon raise about $100M in an IPO.
To promote technological entrepreneurship in this complex industry, informal events are constantly held where scientists and entrepreneurs talk to the general public about what they do, an annual marathon is held right around and inside the science park buildings (so that people can see where everything is). Communications Manager Nicoline Meijer formulated her mission as follows: “It’s not the buildings that matter, it’s the people who change everything. We create conditions for their work and improve their interaction. We want to connect people.”
There will be a huge building for life science startups only. The building is currently under construction, but all places have already been allocated.

The Business Incubator utrechtinc.nl is already operating. Over the course of 5 years, they helped 124 startups from the healthcare and environmental sectors. Startup selection is carried out twice a year. 40 projects are selected annually. Residents receive support for 2.5 years. But the program is divided into blocks. After the first stage, when the teams develop a business model, a pitch session takes place, at which it is decided who will remain in the incubator. Block 2 – first clients, prototype development, again everything ends with a pitch session. Block 3 – scaling. The business incubator is paid - each block costs 1800 euros. When asked how they take money from poor startups, Tijs Markusse (the head of the incubator) answered: “There is no need to help too early, it is important that the startup founder takes the first step without help. Paying the check confirms his motivation in developing the project.”
In addition to space and educational programs, the incubator helps create a team; it helps scientists find an entrepreneur and vice versa. The incubator’s website has a separate section “Co-Founder”, where there is always information about events where you can find a partner. They conduct business courses for scientists and open scientific lectures for entrepreneurs. What do they look at first when selecting? It is important that a person knows how to change. If a person considers himself the best and is not ready to change, then this is not for us. Regardless of the project, we refuse. They also look at the practical experience of team members.
By the way, in the summer the incubator conducts 2 short-term programs for startups - it invited Russian teams.

Now the population of Utrecht is 340,000, 70,000 are students. It can be seen that the city is very young and developing rapidly. I liked the original use of unnecessary space - for example, this is what the roof of one of the buildings where a car park used to be located looks like.

A representative of TNO, the Netherlands Organization for Applied Scientific Research, told a lot of interesting things in Amsterdam about supporting scientific research. In the Netherlands there are 2 main government organizations that finance R&D: NWO funds basic research, TNO - applied R&D.
Applied research in the Netherlands is carried out exclusively at the request of large corporations in five main areas - Industry; Healthy Living; Defense, Safety Urbanisation; Energy.

At the same time, as I understand it, corporations enter into contracts not directly with universities or research institutes, but with TNO. And the task of TNO, using the “Knowledge Base” they have, is to attract universities, research teams of various organizations to solve problems, while supplementing corporate money with budgetary funds.
At the same time, the main kpi for TNO is precisely the amount of money received from corporations for applied R&D.
Industry TNO offers 4 types of services:
1) Consultations (“like PwK”);
2) Engineering;
3) “Technology supply”, when TNO asks industry for problems and finds a solution;
4) Services for the development of the open innovation model. Help industry interact with external developers.
The cost of these services for industry can range from 10,000 to several million euros.
Arij van Berkel (Director of Chemical Industry at TNO) shared his opinion on the problems in the development of the innovation ecosystem in Russia: “In Russia I have seen many talented scientists who, however, cannot implement their technologies. Nobody tells scientists what they need to formalize, what to do in order to cooperate with industry. The most important thing you need to do is create the conditions for interaction between scientists and industry.”

According to him, there are similar TNO organizations in almost all European countries (he listed the names of analogues in Germany, Spain, France, Finland, Sweden...). In his opinion, it is strange that Russia has not yet carried out systematic work on applied research to meet the needs of industry.

I would like to add that in this system, of course, the most important thing is requests from industry. However, if large corporations in the Netherlands operate in global markets, and cooperation with research centers and the introduction of innovations are vital for them in open competition in world markets, then in Russia, traditionally, requests are mainly expected from state corporations, which compete more with each other for the state budget. But I really liked the scheme for financing applied research; I think it can be adapted to Russia given the existing specifics.
Interestingly, TNO is a well-known brand within the Netherlands. More than 90% of the country's residents know about this organization. The level of trust is very high; there are many investment funds around TNO that closely monitor TNO’s activities in order to be the first to see promising projects.

Here are the main things I noted for myself as a result of my 3 days in the Netherlands:
1) The Dutch very skillfully use the characteristics of regions, forming ecosystems taking into account the specifics of a particular place. Eindhoven (use of former Philips infrastructure, BrainStorm strategy), Twente - building an ecosystem around the university, Utrecht - narrow specialization, attracting the best specialists in the industry).
2) The role of the state is to provide infrastructure (using the existing one, at minimal cost), create conditions for effective interaction of all participants in the process, create conditions for business development, tax incentives for start-ups.
3) By financial support
- fundamental science is proactive, financed by the state budget through a special fund
- applied science only at the request of large enterprises, which make a request to a special fund, paying an invoice to it. The Foundation adds budget money and hires universities using the Knowledge Base.
- Innovative activities at the initial stages of project development are supported by repayable loans (rather than grants).
4) In all innovation centers, the most important task for the Dutch is to build trusting relationships between people. “Trust” is probably the most popular word on the trip. Although no - the “bicycle” comes first. published

A competent innovation ecosystem supports the competitiveness of the enterprise, maintaining its high position in the regional and national markets. The company's scientific research must find application in practice, which requires efforts on the part of the company and its partners, research institutes, and various foundations. The efforts of the participants in the process are united thanks to a properly designed innovation ecosystem.

Types of innovation ecosystems

The following varieties are available:

• global ES;
• national (NIES).

The global innovation system makes it possible to create favorable conditions for the implementation of large-scale projects and breakthroughs in various fields of knowledge - the energy sector, the digital world, biotechnology. This supports the world's patent system, unlocking new technologies while preserving intellectual property rights.

National ES exist on the basis of research institutes. Here, innovative entrepreneurship is formed, the foundations are created for new ideas that receive commercial support. These systems employ experienced specialists who know how to set strategic priorities and strive for technological leadership.

General structure

The innovation ecosystem is based on elements such as:

• the science;
• venture investments;
• tangible and intangible infrastructure;
• innovative demand;
• legislative acts, legal conditions.

The scientific basis is created by higher educational institutions. Venture entrepreneurship provides the ecosystem with the necessary financial resources. The infrastructure preserves the latest products and brings them to the foreign market. To create it, you also need to make sure there is demand for it from large businesses. Legislative acts make it possible to regulate relations between market players.