The first stage of the partner search in the Rapid Tampere collaboration program has ended. The four client companies in the program, Sandvik, Kalmar, Caruna and Valmet set their business cases in September and received 295 applications from 45 different countries by the end of October. The large number of applicants reflects the growing attractiveness of Tampere Region internationally. Most applications came from the United States, United Kingdom, Finland, Germany and India.
295 companies altogether expressed their interest in the Rapid Tampere challenge. Most applications came from the United States, United Kingdom, Finland, Germany and India.
Attractive clients raise global interest
The Rapid Tampere challenges deal with controlling physical strain at work, sensor technology, safe working environments and enriching data.
We have been approached by a multitude of interesting growth companies from different parts of the world. The great interest surely stems from the fact that the client companies are seen as interesting development partners by growth companies on a global level. In addition to social media and our personal contacts, we used different kinds of hubs, investor contacts and of course direct contacting in the search process, explains Kenneth Salonius from Vertical.
Artificial Intelligence, IoT and robotics were well presented among the applicants.
Vertical operates the day to day matters in Rapid Tampere and supports the clients during the project.
56% of the companies that applied to the accelerator are at the early market entry phase which means that there are early adopters of their solutions but no set client base. 18% of the companies have advanced to the steady growth phase. Artificial Intelligence, IoT, Robotics, Machine Learning, Analytics and Computer Vision are the most common fields of business.
“We are especially happy to have as much as 31% of the companies focusing on hardware as these companies tend to be a little bigger and more advanced and thus harder to entice,” points out Jouni Myllymäki from Business Tampere.
To Tampere, and beyond!
The four clients will next decide with whom they would like to meet face to face. 30 to 50 companies will then be invited to Tampere to share their ideas during Value Proposition Days. The clients will choose their collaboration partners by the end of the year.
“The timeline from there on depends of course on the nature and content of each project. It is however completely realistic to expect pilot collaborations to start during 2020”, estimates Kenneth Salonius.
We are also preparing for the next round of Rapid Tampere and new challenges from our client companies.
Rapid Tampere is the first cooperation accelerator in the Tampere area. City of Tampere and Tampere Region Economic Development Agency Business Tampere are supporting its launch. The accelerator is operated by Vertical together with Eversheds.
