Enhancing policies through interregional cooperation: New industrial value chains for growth
European regions can contribute to EU industry renewal, competitiveness and internationalization through new ways of industry-led interregional cooperation and by leveraging and developing their own areas of industrial specialisation in relation to those of other regions. Within the Vanguard Initiative New Growth through Smart Specialisation, the S34Growth partners have been pioneering a new approach to European industry-led interregional cooperation since late 2013. As regions desire to leverage their own strengths in combination with innovation capacity in other regions interregionally, the existing policy structures and financing frames need to be improved to suit these interregional ambitions.

The main objective of the S34Growth project is to develop and improve existing regional policy instruments to facilitate interregional collaboration, which in turn will support the renewal of Europe’s industry and competitiveness. The project focuses on industrial innovation related interregional collaboration.

The project will engage ten European regions from 8 EU countries, as well as businesses, universities and other innovation actors from the regions, in innovative policy-learning, exchange of experience and co-creation activities. S34Growth activities build on an innovative methodology (learn, connect, demonstrate, commercialise) identified within the Vanguard Initiative, which consists of regional stakeholders learning from each other, connecting the organisations and activities, and moving on to demonstration projects with the ultimate goal of improving commercialisation and product and service development processes. 

As the main result of the S34Growth project, an innovative interregional element to the addressed regional policy instruments is developed, supporting the interregional, co-specialization approach to smart specialisation, and to be easily replicated at any domain and anywhere in Europe.