Sustainability assessment of innovation areas in Vinnväxt

Summary:

In VINNVÄXT Vinnova finances regional innovation clusters (network between industry, academia, political and public

organisations). The purpose is to ´promote sustainable regional growth by developing internationally competitiveness in

specific growth areas.´ Vinnova is now working to enhance the sustainability profile of the different VINNVÄXT

environments.

Phase 1 of this work began in the spring of 2014 through pilot projects in three innovation environments (Triple Steelix,

Skåne Food Innovation and Future Biorefinery). The idea is to make sustainability a core part of the business and operations

reporting.

In Phase 2 Vinnova wants to develop a platform for collaborative learning for all VINNVÄXT environments, so they can work

themselves to raise sustainability issues in a strategic manner. Vinnova´s goal is that all VINNVÄXT initiatives formulate

sustainability as an integral part of their business, clearly communicable and monitorable.

We propose a project, which beyond Vinnova´s comprehensive and specific requirements for Phase 2 would also focus on the

development of methods (design of the process itself, and templates or models for assessment) for the integration of

sustainability strategies in innovation and sustainability assessment of innovations.

In brief, the project is summarized as follows:

1. Getting to know the clusters in individual meetings

2. Identify their challenges in a sustainability and futures perspective

3. Develop, implement and spread methods to identify and follow up sustainability efforts

4. Find ways to improve sustainability efforts

5. Toolbox for sustainability assessment of innovations

6. Share methodology and experiences with other VINNVÄXT initiatives