Smart tools for quick and easy business start-up in Europe: the once-only challenge
START EASY is an initiative promoted by the Government of Catalonia in cooperation with national, regional & local authorities as well as other stakeholders from all corners of Europe (BE, ES, FR, IT, LT, LV, PL), which endeavours to create the best conditions for growth. The project will improve policy making & deliver smart tools that enable a conducive environment for business to start easy & quickly, boosting business startup activity & competitiveness in Europe.

By learning from one another (peer reviews), exchanging & integrating good practices (GP) from all over Europe (study visits, research and studies, etc.), & developing joint strategies (workshops & other events), the partnership will overcome common challenges identified such as: the difficult and costly process behind regulations governing business creation which tend to discourage entrepreneurial activity; the limited responsiveness of the public administration to the needs of these new startups, thereby making necessary to catch up in the digitalization of public services, once-only principle (OOP) for business data registration, one-stop shop (OSS) models, etc.

Numerous activities have been therefore structured in Phase 1 to promote active interregional exchange and effective stakeholder engagement for joint development of Action Plans (AP), as well as EU-wide dissemination. The plans should conduce improvements in the policy instruments selected, delivering new & enhanced public services & tools that facilitate the entry of new businesses into the marketplace (new projects supporting digital services, OOP, OSS, & administrative simplification in general will be supported). They should also conduce to better governance, engaging multiple stakeholders in policy understanding, development and implementation, in particular key decision and policy makers at the different governance levels (including Managing Authorities (MA)), agents from the startup ecosystem and business enabling institutions (BEI)).