The City of Tampere is running for the Europe’s innovation capital

The European Capital of Innovation Award (iCapital) 2016 competition, organised by the European Commission rewards the European city which is building the best “innovation ecosystem”, connecting citizens, public organisations, academia, and business. Given that urban areas generate two thirds of the EU’s GDP, it is these areas that will contribute the most to making Europe more innovative. The new Capital of Innovation will receive €950 000 to scale up its innovation activities. The second and third cities in the ranking will respectively receive €100 000 and €50 000 for networking activities.   The European Capital of Innovation was elected for the first time in 2014, when Barcelona won the title. Now chosen for the second time, the European Capital of Innovation will be announced in spring 2016.

”Tampere meets every requirement for being elected the European Capital of Innovation 2016”, says the mayor of Tampere, Anna-Kaisa Ikonen.

“We have a long tradition in innovation politics and we are both national and international pioneers on the development of open innovation platforms. Finland is known in Europe for the Tampere-based innovation network Demola”, Ikonen continues.

Tampere’s application for the iCapital tells the city’s innovation history: the city was built around the traditional industry, molded through Nokia into a knowledge-based economic region and from that onwards to an innovation laboratory grounded in excellence, where the city enables open innovation experiments for companies and developers.

”In the application, we highlight Tesoma as a new kind of a smart development environment for services and urban development. In addition to Tesoma, what sets us apart from the other applicants are the innovation platforms already in action: New Factory, Demola and Mediapolis. In the EU competition for the European Capital of Innovation the emphasis is on bringing the innovation activity close to the citizens and the residents participating in it – which is exactly the way that Tampere looks at it: the city as an innovation platform”, sums up the director of the Baltic Institute of Finland Esa Kokkonen, who was also responsible for compiling the application.

In Tampere, the prize funds would go for example towards developing of new service models, digital health innovations and intelligent transport services for the new well-being centre being built in Tesoma. Utilizing open data solutions and innovative public procurement are the city’s pivotal instruments when it comes to generating service innovations.

You can visit and read through Tampere’s application for the European Capital of Innovation Award in innovationcapital.fi.