Case Study - Swiss Entrepreneurship Program (Swiss EP): Support to Startup Macedonia in Macedonia, January 2018

​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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See also: “Connecting the Macedonian Ecosystem, 2018“ - research following Startup Common’s framework for ecosystem development, where Startup Macedonia engaged in conversation with startups and support organization to identify key challenges and opportunities for an ecosystem growth.

sm_ecosystem_research_2018.pdf
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