The Open Innovation programs The Journey and Protechting achieved major pilot results – involving 23 startups from 15 countries, in three continents – to develop new solutions on Tourism, Fintech, Insurtech and Healthtech businesses
The crucial moment for establishing collaborative processes between corporates and startups, within Open Innovation programs, is unquestionably the Bootcamp. Under the method implemented by Beta-i over the years (and it’s been a decade!), Bootcamps are the turning point of every program, as the people behind the needs of organizations and the solutions brought by startups meet one on one, to develop something new – and collectively get achievable results.
The latest Beta-i Bootcamps on Tourism (The Journey) and the Fintech, Healthtech and Insurtech triad (Protechting) are a robust example of this process, with 29 pilots going to be considered and developed from 23 startups of 15 countries to impact both B2B and B2C fronts.
The Journey: innovation in Tourism
This Open Innovation program deals with one of the most interconnected industries of the contemporary era: Tourism, a gigantic cluster that generates economic, social and even identity consequences for the destinations visited. Goes without saying that the Tourism sector has been booming in Portugal for years in a row, and that’s why this Open Innovation program has been connecting key players in the Portuguese market with innovators from all over the world. “The Tourism Industry is one of the most competitive ones, and we must build everyday solutions and new services to our customers while envisioning the future,” explains Sergio Guerreiro, Senior Director Knowledge Management & Innovation from Turismo de Portugal, one of the organizations investing in the program alongside Barraqueiro Group, Parques de Sintra – Monte da Lua and Vila Galé Hotels (in addition to Unicre, a key payment solutions provider in the country that participates as a Data Partner).
Every innovator deserves a break: The Journey participants on a hop-on hop-off bus and boat
In its 4th edition, the program investigated and selected startups able to tackle Hospitality, Parks & Monuments and Tours & Activities pain points shared by our clients, then linked to themes such as Smart Connected Operations, Seamless Traveler Journey, Customer Experience and Sustainable Development Solutions. These scouting challenges emerge a result of the needs assessments carried out by Beta-i’s expert team alongside the participant corporates teams, so the process can converge to common goals from the very beginning – and so can be explored in the Bootcamp.
The result of this concerted effort generated in the end of October the excellent result of 17 pilots, from 11 startups of 6 countries in Europe and Asia. “This number is a result of the program’s direct response to these tourism operators challenges,” says Gonçalo Faria, Open Innovation Program Director at Beta-i, who also highlights “some very interesting solutions on water and energy efficiency, aiming for a more sustainable tourism”. The results of this collaboration will be known at the end of January 2020, when The Journey comes to an end with one of the key events for tourism innovation businesses in Portugal: the Lisbon Tourism Summit 2020, focused on sustainability and organized by Beta-i, which counts with The Journey’s Demo Day on its programming: in other words, the moment when the results of these collaboratively developed pilots are presented to the stakeholders.
Protechting: tackling multiple industry challenges and geographies
Bootcamps are a special moment because, as Beta-i Senior Growth Strategist Tomás Bento recalls, “startups come in very ambitious for the program, but sometimes lack the experience to make the best win-win connections with corporates. And we believe that our contribution is fundamental to trim every potential down to the very essentials, and help them set up a bolder pitch”. And that’s exactly what happened at the Protechting bootcamp, which ended on November 21st in Lisbon, where 12 pilots were selected out of 21 different startups from 12 countries in three continents. As Beta-i’s Program Director Francisco Carvalho adds, “thanks to this collaboration, some startups were able to fully adapt their technologies, turning their initial proposals into much more fit and desirable solutions for the participant corporates”.
Shiny happy people: corporates, startups and Beta-i celebrating the closing of Protechting Bootcamp
Protechting is defiant by definition as it brings together different industries under the leadership of the same shareholder, the Chinese group Fosun – the name behind companies such as Fidelidade (Insurtech track), Luz Saúde Learning Health (Healthtech track) and the German bank Hauck & Aufhäuser (Fintech track). The process was tailored to this consortium, which in addition to different industries also operates in different geographies and has a particular involvement with China. To solve that, two groups of startups were selected: one for pilots development, and another (with more primary business models, coming from other 5 countries) for a parallel mentoring and acceleration path. “We truly believe in Open Innovation. The Protechting program gives us access to startups from around the world, and in order to accommodate both our strategic and geographic goals, we created these two groups. The pre-acceleration one is focused on bringing startups from markets where we are expanding right now, such as Mozambique and Peru” says José Villa de Freitas, Fidelidade’s marketing manager.
This strategic ambition facilitated by Protechting is reinforced by Harald Patt, CEO at Fosun Europe Innovation Hub and Managing Director of Fosun’s Wealth Department and Fintech Sector. Responsible for the Chinese group’s deal flow on startups, Patt sees the program as a concrete way to incorporate new solutions into the company portfolio. “In addition to the areas where we operate around the world, it is important to remember that we´re deeply rooted in China and we are able to generate great opportunities there.”
Bootcamps are particularly prized by Patt, since it’s the crucial moment where original ideas, created to solve people and organizations daily problem, leverage their approaches as business models. “It’s exciting. Startups with good ideas and bad pitches often turn out to present amazing solutions at the end of the pilot phase. Not to mention that this is the moment of truth, where they must prove a differentiated and scalable technology”. What was a surprise in the beginning – a global open innovation program set up all the way from Portugal – now is the new normal to him: “although central Europe is not always paying attention, the Portuguese ecosystem is very active and we are aware of this”.
I was at the South Summit in Madrid last week on a mission to explore this innovation platform. I can say it was interesting, impacting and at the same time, consuming.
Here are my personal takeaways from the event:
The spanish innovation ecosystem is booming, and it’s reaching out to the world
South Summit is, however you want to spin it, a very spanish event. But that is not necessarily a bad thing, quite on the contrary! The startup scene in Spain is becoming very mature. Madrid and Barcelona are true European innovation hotspots and surprising local ecosystems are arising in Andaluzia, Galicia, Asturias and Basque Country. But this is also an event that is attracting startups from all over the world (and not only the usual suspects from Europe and Latin America).
Collaboration is the name of the game – Corporates <3 Startups <3 Corporates
Innovation is more and more becoming a space for collaboration between different stakeholders, and big corporates are more than ever interested in working with startups in new solutions and testing disruptive technologies in their operations and businesses. Most of the corporates represented in South Summit already have some kind of structured approach to deal with startups and some already have acceleration and open innovation programs.
Let’s talk about talks! It’s all about networking…
Just between you and me… what’s the thing about these events and the non-ending agenda of talks about the same topics, all over again, where the content ends up being… let’s say it… not really interesting. OK, I do suffer from FOMO everytime I go to these events and end up watching a few talks on topics that I’m interested in. But more times than not I end up being utterly disappointed. But then, the real value of events like this is the networking and the possibility of meeting in the same place amazing startups and innovators. Come for the talks and stay for the networking…
AI in the front seat, Data in the engine
We are finally seeing big companies apply AI in real use cases and not only doing pilots and small controlled experiments. But AI runs on data, and we still need to work on issues like data sharing frameworks, information architecture, stakeholders collaboration and… privacy. The GDPR trauma is long gone but companies are still finding ways to integrate data protection in their data strategies.
Health startups are coming, and Mobility is here
Of the many hot topics in South Summit my eyes went to Healthcare and Mobility. On healthcare new solutions are arising in diagnostics and devices, and you should take a look at Mentalab, one of the amazing startups that accelerated with Data Pitch. Also take a look at the winner of this track – 2eyesvision. And mobility is booming with solutions ranging from drones, logistics, shared mobility and of course, MaaS solutions like iomob, the winner of this track.
We invite you to meet Corship, a consortium co-funded by European Union, that counts with 7 selected partners representing universities, corporates, startups and innovation networks – Beta-i amongst them.
Here is all you need to know about it.
Corship’s mission is to establish and improve the collaboration across Europe, between startups, corporates and universities, with education.
This joint language and collaboration is done by connecting these entities through 3 core results:
A Massive Open Online Course (MOOC)
Currently preparing the field to a 2020 MOOC entirely dedicated to the collaboration process between these three entities, this will be the first MOOC on Corporate Entrepreneurship connecting and upskilling 1.500+ entrepreneurs, managers and students.
This course will be open for registration from December 2019 and will last up to six weeks. It will be the first core result of the project and open and free for everyone. Completely online, through the platform mooc.house.
After reading, watching videos, answering questions (multiple choice) and quizzes, besides taking part in discussions and work individually and in a group, participants will also have the chance to apply for the MicroCredential.
A Microcredential
Corship presents the first MicroCredential (a modular, flexible format stemming from MOOCs) pilot world-wide on corporate entrepreneurship. This is a modular, flexible mini degree on very specific topics. After the MOOC, this is will be a dedicated high-level training offered to 10 entrepreneurs, 10 managers and 10 students.
It will last eight weeks and will include two face-to-face workshops and three online moments. Applications for the MicroCredential are done via the MOOC and open in April 2020.
A Toolbox
A unique Corporate Entrepreneurship Toolbox with guidelines and tools to facilitate the collaboration between the 3 target groups. These guidelines will be complemented with a practical selection of popular, but also less-known, self-developed, hands-on entrepreneurial tools.
The first prototype is to be ready in January 2020!
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Get to know the latest research report that is part of the project’s background and follow Corship to get all the updates.
You can even have add up a pinch of Sustaintech and there you go: the fourth edition of Protechting is on the making.
After three previous successful editions, Protechting is back to promote the collaboration between startups and established corporations. It has now two different tracks to boost startups growth, according to their maturity: a Piloting track and a new Pre-Acceleration track, with a spotlight at sustainable and socially impacting solutions.
Protechting 4.0 – applications open
Healthtech, Insurtech and Fintech startups – If you are eager to pilot your solution or to speed up your growth, here are the Partners who are making it happen:
Fidelidade
As the largest insurance group in Portugal, with over 200 years of existence and an international presence, Fidelidade consists of a group of companies in the insurance and health sectors, including also a combination of services, that as a whole, protect the future of families, companies and Country. If Protection is your thing, this is the partner for you.
Fidelidade is here from the very first edition of Protechting (Jesus, it has been a few years now) noticing how startups have been bringing innovation and a new look into these areas. Shout out to the brave winners of the first edition of the program: EctoSense LifeSymb and CleenBeen.
Hospital da Luz Learning Health
Inside Luz Saúde Group, Hospital da Luz Learning Health is dedicated to the advanced training of professionals, translational research and innovation, in healthcare provision and management.
As the improvement of knowledge, technologies and advanced practices in healthcare are what makes their DNA, you can already see that innovation is part of the job and therefore the right partner to collaborate – “Healthteching” speaking.
Hauck & Aufhäuser
Hauck & Aufhäuser presents itself as the Fintech partner for Protechting. Adding not only knowledge and expertise into the area, it adds also to the international focus of the program, since it is a private german bank, with a 220-year history.
This is actually the most recent partner of the program, joining for the previous edition in 2018 – in fact here is their own testimony entering Proteching.
Fosun
Fosun was founded in 1992 and is a family-focused multinational company listed on the main board of the Hong Kong Stock Exchange (00656.HK) since 2007. With its roots in China, and through technology and innovation, Fosun’s mission is to create customer-to-maker (C2M) ecosystems in health, happiness and wealth. The group embraces all the other partners of the program.
Actually, the presence of Fosun in Protechting is what can be taking you to China: The three best solutions of the piloting track will get the chance to participate in a roadshow in China with access to some of the largest global investors.
Wrapping up here, it goes without saying that Protechting is powered by Beta-i, so if you feel like you could use some more info or just wish to chat, you can reach us at scouting@beta-i.com
Applications for Protechting are now open – you can apply here
Word-playing aside, the Journey is now on it’s third edition, a brand new marathon of pilot projects on the making to disrupt the tourism industry.
For all the startups that want to take their chance to apply to this open innovation program, these are the brave partners that are following the path of innovation, with Turismo de Portugal as the main enabler and Unicre as the program’s data partner.
Completing the list, here are the ones more than ready to work side by side for pilot development:
1. Parques de Sintra – Monte da Lua
In order to understand Parques de Sintra – Monte da lua, one needs to understand a bit of Sintra: we are talking about a mysterious mountain (the Serra de Sintra, also known as Monte da Lua) that includes the exquisite village with the same name – Sintra – as well as astonishingly beautiful and unique parks and monuments, part of UNESCO world heritage.
Following this UNESCO classification of the Sintra Cultural Landscape is 1995, Parques de Sintra was then created in the year 2000 to manage and optimize the area’s monuments, parks and properties.
— > The Journey you could take with this partner: Parques de Sintra – Monte da Lua joined this year as a program partner and would like to solve several challenges such as management of visitor flows, visitor counting and tracking systems, outdoor and indoor geolocation, fauna and flora identification, among several others. The idea is to optimize the experience of every visit.
2. Barraqueiro
Barraqueiro is a rerun partner for this edition of The Journey. Established as an international player and a leader in the Iberian transport sector, Grupo Barraqueiro is an experienced company founded in 1915. Constantly looking to evolve, it specializes in the design and implementation of innovative passenger and freight mobility solutions, in a sustainable way.
— > The Journey you could take with this partner: From finding smarter, safer and easier ticketing systems, to tracking and optimizing routes to reduce points of friction and tourism pressure, there is a lot to work with Barraqueiro, as these are a few examples. The purpose is to truly innovate the way of work, enhancing the customer experience and smoothing the business.
3. Vila Galé
Also partnering with The Journey for the first time, Vila Galé appears as one of the largest Portuguese hotel groups, managing 34 hotel units (25 in Portugal and nine in Brazil). Envisioning to be a benchmark company in the hospitality industry, the group also aspires to an economic growth that is sustainable, as well as socially and environmentally responsible.
— > The Journey you could take with this partner: As the creator of a disruptive solution, you could be helping Vila Galé to optimize energy and water consumption, predict maintenance for buildings or even bring out a brand new domotics system, among several other ways in which a hotel can be much more than that and add value to the whole touristic experience.
Ps. A lot on your mind or just don’t know where to begin? Don’t worry, Beta-i’s team is here to guide you through. Leave us a message at scouting@beta-i.com
