Startup Commons has recently been selected by City of Marbella as the service provider to design a "one-stop-shop" ecosystem portal application to showcase real-time information about ecosystem people, startups, events, support services, development projects and beyond from the digital entrepreneurship ecosystem in Marbella.

Cristóbal Garre, councilor for economic development for City of Marbella, highlighted the importance of “initiating this project as part of Marbella Digital initiative, which is targeting to boost digital entrepreneurship in Marbella. It is very strategic for us to start the inventory of Marbella startup ecosystem as the first step to know the starting point of the ecosystem. Information like what is going on in the startup ecosystem, who is who, who is doing what and why,  where and when are things happening, etc. is very relevant for us in order to start connecting the different ecosystem actors but also to understand over time together with Startup Commons team the services and activities that we are missing in the ecosystem and that we should deploy in order to increase the volume of business creation as well as their quality so that local startups in Marbella can compete in global markets. By knowing that information will help us prioritise the actions and therefore the resources to smartly support entrepreneurs and startups in Marbella”.

The project will kick off by gathering information from existing ecosystem players and users, continuing with its subsequent standardization according to Startup Commons Framework and finishing with the identification of the missing gaps within the ecosystem (services, activities, etc.). The output of this data collection process will be used as part of the designing works that Startup Commons team will carry out to propose a digital solution that help startups get the right services and connections at the right time, and to help public sector decision makers as well as both public and private service providers tailor their services to the specific needs of the startups and other ecosystem actors.

There is mutual interest between City of Marbella and Startup Commons in this project being the solid foundation on which a digital infrastructure is built to enable connectivity and data flow of ecosystem activities and processes in real-time.

​This is originally posted by Startup Commons Team. You are free to re-edit and repost this in your own blog or other use under Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License terms, by giving credit with a link to www.startupcommons.org and the original post

In a global context where there are tons of materials and knowledge about how to create and grow your startup, startups still do not know where to start, what to focus on, when to do what, and how to identify what’s next. They also do not know how this all connect in sync with support, trainings and services available in a local ecosystem.

It is necessary for startup ecosystems to have a common language and framework to describe, track, measure and guide entrepreneurship and innovation from an “Idea to Product into a Scalable Business” and from “Talent to Team to an effective Organization” to eventually bring efficiency and transparency to help entrepreneurs and startups navigate along the startup journey.

Startup ecosystem development is about breaking ecosystem silos, sharing resources, removing inefficiencies and bringing connectivity and standardisation at all levels. When it comes to transferring entrepreneurship and startup knowledge, more transparency, common sense and efficiency is needed on how it is structured, connected and delivered.

For these the reasons we have created our Growth Academy.

We believe that when entrepreneurs and startups are educated with the right knowledge, while working together in an ecosystem - together we will be able to remove or significantly reduce the highest “universal risks” - We will also be able to educate and inform stakeholders about optimal methods and structures for startups that are strong and flexible enough to sustain failures at various levels, while minimizing the possibility of terminal failure. We will provide reasoning and will connect with other sources and data that support the knowledge and views provided.

Startup Commons has been implementing the Growth Academy program in different startup ecosystems at different levels by partnering with local support providers - but our mission is always “scaling entrepreneurship and innovation”.
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Growth Academy eLearning

So we are now working to bring a digital eLearning solution to help scale Startup Commons Growth Academy to reach a global audience, - so that all entrepreneurs in the world can benefit to improve their potential for success.

Startup Commons has entered into partnership with StartupContinuum, a Calgary, Alberta based startup aligned with Startup Commons’ mission. StartupContinuum is a company that is founded by team of successful serial entrepreneurs who have built and exited a successful eLearning company before. StartupContinuum is creating an innovative online learning environment, with templates and support tools to help startups succeed by fully adapting Startup Commons’ world-renowned framework and curriculum.

The learning platform will be initially rolled out module by module in Calgary, with great support and input from the local Calgary startup community and ecosystem. This ecosystem is actively adopting Startup Commons Framework via key ecosystem players like the Calgary Innovation Coalition (CIC), Alberta Innovates, Calgary Technologies Inc and Rainforest Alberta.

After initial launching, the StartupContinuum / Growth Academy learning platform will actively start expanding to the rest of Alberta and Canada. In parallel, we at Startup Commons will start promoting it to be deployed in Europe and Asia.

Along with publicly announcing this great initiative, we are announcing an open call for all support providers catering support services directly for business creators to invite them to become a key game changer, to deploy and connect Growth Academy in their local ecosystem for a real impact in their local ecosystem.

Are you a Business Creator, Support Provider or Ecosystem Developer? Are you frustrated by the lack of good applications or models to solve your big pain point and cant find a proper solutions?

Share your pain with us, and we will share it with motivated app developers, looking to build applications to problems worth solving and look into ways of co-creating and contributing along the way.

To get creative juices flowing, we are sharing one such concept "open ipr" openly here with the world that have been iteratively developed as part of Startup Commons work with European Commission and several ecosystems, to help solve the problem of unused resources and other IPR not connecting with innovative business creators - leaving more than 90% valuable research findings being under utilized in business creation. ​

​Download PDF below or open via Google Drive for comments and questions.

​Step 2: Identify a customer segment.
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Do you want to build an app for business creators, support providers, or ecosystem developers?

Step 3: Develop empathy for your target customer segment.

Engage in perspective taking to understand target segment needs by asking questions and gaining ground-level experience. We suggest conducting informational interviews and shadowing people in your target customer segment. The goal of this step is to gain an understanding of what matters most to the people in your target customer segment and figure out what challenges they face.

Step 4: Define the problem that you want to solve.

Based on the needs of your target customer segment, create a clear definition of the problem that you want to solve for them.

Step 5: Ideate solutions to the problem.

Sketch and model ideas for how you can solve the problem. There are no bad ideas at this stage. Put every possibility on the table, and defer judgement until the end of the process. Ideating solutions is most effective with a team or group of collaborators. Once you have entertained all possibilities, vote and choose the idea that you would like to pursue.

Step 6: Prototype your solution.

Build a minimum viable product (MVP). This version of the product should allow you to collect the maximum amount of information about customer preferences with the least effort. Hackernoon.com provides an excellent guide to minimum viable products. 

Step 7: Test your application.

Engage in validated learning. Use focus groups and customer feedback to figure out what works and where improvements are needed.  

Step 8: Repeat steps 3-7.

Follow the lean methodology of build-measure-learn-repeat. However, don’t be afraid to submit your application once you reach this step! You can always keep improving it.

​Startup Commons has released entire Growth Academy innovation entrepreneurship curriculum training materials with more than 700+ slides, along with supporting booklets​ for free co-development and use.
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All is released under Creative Commons licensing and in editable format.​​​

The curriculum is built, designed and refined over the years to increase the volume of entrepreneurship and likelihood of startup success by focusing on removing or reducing the biggest “universal risks” and to educate about optimal methods and structures.
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The base knowledge shared via these trainings is accumulation of more than twenty years of international serial entrepreneurship experience combined with more than ten years of parallel experience on startup advisory. 

➡️ ​If you are interested join our facebook groups:
Startup Ecosystem Developers
Innovation Entrepreneurship Education providers/trainers
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​Background

Swisscontact, in consortium with J.E. Austin Associates, is supporting the strengthening of
entrepreneurship ecosystem organizations and actors to aid the development of business
startups and growth-oriented small businesses in Macedonia.

Description of the mission

• Assist in designing the process to collect all relevant data  for Macedonian Startup Ecosystem Research that Startup Macedonia plans to undertake, including questions regarding
  • Historical data – the origin of the company & organization (needs & problem they wanted to solve) and previous activities (ex, number of startups mentored, and the corresponding results).
  • Actual data – current challenges (current opinion of the startup scene, how are they pivoting from the original idea and why).
  • Future plans – expectations for change and activities they are trying to implement, sustainability and business model changes.  

 

• Share Startup Commons experience in ecosystem building and support around the world, to share best practices aimed to increase volume of startups in Macedonia and how to boost collaboration between corporates and startups. Guiding Startup Macedonia in developing Advisor Program based on best practices in the world where the incentive for advisors would be to gain equity in early innovative startups. Highlight comparisons and experiences relevant to Startup Macedonia future plans and activities. 

 

• Help in improving the methodology, tools, techniques and criterias for mapping the ecosystem in a matter of making effective matching and showcasing the pulse of macedonian startup ecosystem on real time by helping startups get the right services and connections at the right time, and help public & private sector decision makers and service providers tailor their services to the specific needs of the startups and other ecosystem actors. Also, design a set of metrics that can give Startup Macedonia objective information to modify, adjust or refine current action plan and accelerate things. 

Target of the mission

The main objective of the mission was to strengthen the capabilities of the managers/members of Startup Macedonia to manage the association in a sustainable way, and to offer quality demand-driven services and support to the ecosystem as a whole.

Output

We delivered final report where we proposed a roadmap plan working at multiple levels (connecting top-down and bottom-up approaches, taking into account specific function verticals and business vertical ecosystems) but being conducted step by step in very transparent manner to achieve consensus and solid progress amongst key ecosystem players within Macedonia ecosystem.
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​This is originally posted by Startup Commons Team. You are free to re-edit and repost this in your own blog or other use under Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License terms, by giving credit with a link to www.startupcommons.org and the original post