Website EFRO grant period 2021-2027

For the EFRO program period 2021-2027, the new website www.efro-oost.eu was recently put online. On this site, you can find all the current information about the program EFRO 2021-2027 for Eastern Netherlands.

In the coming period, the site will be further supplemented with information about the grant opportunities, openings, rules, budgets, news, stories from entrepreneurs/beneficiaries and information needed for progress and final reports. Keep an eye on this website if you are an entrepreneur and would like to make use of it. (Please note, the website is in Dutch)

Zomer Ondernemer Rijk van Nijmegen

The ZomerOndernemer Rijk van Nijmegen project will start in mid-July. ZomerOndernemer Rijk van Nijmegen is an entrepreneurial project in which young people aged between 15 and 25 living in the region are helped to start up their own business. In this way, young people can become acquainted with entrepreneurship. An entrepreneurial attitude offers more perspective. You see more opportunities and possibilities and that is exactly what is transferred and stimulated among this target group.

The participants receive professional coaching and resources not only to work out the business idea, but also to execute the idea. In the past, this has resulted in numerous young people starting their own businesses thanks to ZomerOndernemer. And that throughout the Netherlands.

This project is being carried out in collaboration with various companies in the Nijmegen region. This includes workshops, speakers and company visits to interesting entrepreneurs. The project lasts 6 weeks with a three-day entrepreneurial training as a kick-off. This is followed by a number of return days followed by a festive kick-off where the participants present their own company.

Participation is completely free and is made possible by Fonds 21 and the municipalities of Nijmegen, Beuningen, Wijchen, Berg en Dal and Druten. More information: www.zomerondernemer.nl.

Get a weekly pitch tip from Frank Smallegange

To keep your public speaking skills fresh you should work on them on a regular basis. For most of us however the trigger to work on these skills is when we have to give our next presentation. To make it easy to keep your presentation skills on top of mind he started #FrankSays. With this hashtag he publishes, every Thursday, a practical pitch tip on Linked In.

If you want to keep improving your public speaking skills follow him on Linked In.

Story: Safe and sound under the Micro-Cosmos

At Briskr, we believe in the power of a strong network. Nijmegen is a hub for health and high tech, which means we have lots of companies in the area that are at the forefront of groundbreaking inventions. Take Micro-Cosmos, a company that creates an environment free of stimuli, so that patients improve recovery in their own space. A great example of how an idea can be transformed into real-life solutions.

Eef Lamers is the co-founder of Micro-Cosmos, but he is fair enough to admit the idea did not come from him. “At a Health Hackathon organized by the Radboudumc, medical professionals and students came up with the idea. I knew those students, but they were too busy finishing their studies to turn the idea into action. I suggested I could try and make it happen, and that’s how it all got started.” At that moment, the product was no more than a drawing. The problem it had to solve was patients in hospitals suffering from the many stimuli in their surroundings. “As a result, patients develop a lack of sleep, which causes a slower recovery.”

We need a solution!
As Eef explained, the product was developed with a very clear goal in mind. “The Hackathon was organized to solve this problem: patients need peaceful surroundings to recover.” In addition to improved patient care, the advantages of a solution are obvious to hospitals as well. “Of all elderly in Intensive Care Units, 70 per cent develop delirium: a state of confusion and disorientation. Because of this, on average, people stay hospitalized 7 more days and recovery takes longer. If you take in mind that daily costs of hospitalization are 500 to 2.000 euros, the possible benefits are quite clear.”

In his efforts to create the best possible solution, Eef maintains close connections with medical professionals from various hospitals. “I don’t have a medical background myself – I studied physics – so I have gathered researchers, patients and nurses to give feedback about the Micro-Cosmos.” We are currently doing a pilot with Radboudumc. At the Intensive and Medium Care Units, and at Cardiology, we are looking into the effects of the Micro-Cosmos on quality of sleep, stress, fear and delirium. We use pilots like these to learn about the ideal circumstances to use the Micro-Cosmos.”

Growing step by step
As a young company, Micro-Cosmos could use some help when they started in 2020. One of the ways they found the help they needed, was through attending Briskr workshops. “We needed to know things like: how does an insurance company work? How do you launch a healthcare product? The workshops helped us find our way. Many doors opened because we could get in touch with people giving us information.” This way, Eef also found partners that helped the company develop. “We are in touch with HealthValley and OostNL. The latter helped us clarify what we didn’t know about investors. This eventually led to a successful application for an innovation loan.”

The company continues to take steps toward its final goal. “We want the Micro-Cosmos to be a standard option for patients all over Europe by 2030. To reach this goal, we have to keep proving that our solution works.” The pilots in the Netherlands helped them gather valuable data on the impact of the Micro-Cosmos, but potentially revolutionary research is about to start in Germany. “We just returned from Berlin, where a year-long pilot will provide the most important information we could possibly get. Two-thousand patients are part of the study, which will help us convince other hospitals of the value of the Micro-Cosmos.”

Podcast Ai for Life: Adaptive Learning

Ep. 11 – Adaptive Learning
Listen to this episode from AI for Life on Spotify. The latest podcast about AI in Nijmegen is about adaptive learning. More and more schools are using digital tools to help students learn, and increasingly these tools are becoming intelligent. By giving real-time feedback and adapting the lessons for the individual student. In this podcast, we discuss the current state of the art and some of the challenges of this technology. How do you balance the needs of an individual student with those of the rest of the class? How do you use these tools in hybrid environments of physical learning and digital learning? And are these tools suitable for all teachers and learners?

In this podcast we talk to: Inge Molenaar, associate professor of educational studies at Radboud University Marieke van Osch, educational expert at the Ministry and Radboudumc and Jorieke Willems of the education company Gynzy.

Listen the podcast here on Spotify.

Innoboot 2022

Innoboot is the annual seminar organzsed by Briskr, Radboud University, RadboudUMC and the HAN. This year the theme was about the disruptive effects that AI has in the most important economic clusters in the region: Health, High Tech and Energy.

The first keynote was from Marcel van Gerven, Professor at Radboud University with the title “Brain inspired computing”. At Donders Institute, a cooperation between Radboud University and RadboudUMC, they try to learn from the human brain and translate this into advanced and more versatile AI approaches. Our brain is not a brute force machine (we would not be able to supply the energy) but has advanced approaches to predict and follow-up on the best paths. This research leads to more promising algorithms as well as better suited hardware, for example devices that help blind people see though a camera and feeding the brain with signals through implants.

For each cluster health, hightech and energy examples have been given. Read the full article.

SocialTech Network Series

With our population expected to grow in the coming decades, the Netherlands is
bound to face an increasing need for more resilient and effective healthcare.
To tackle the challenges before they become an issue of the future, municipalities are
looking towards innovation as the way forward. The Municipality of The Hague is
strongly committed to bringing startups into the social domain to develop the products
and services that are most needed.

Together with YES!Delft, the Municipality of The Hague is running the SocialTech
Startup Network Series, giving startups exclusive access to the Hague’s social domain
ecosystem. For this series, our main focus is to find technological solutions that help
people to stay healthy and independent at home.

If you are a startup (past the ideation stage) with an innovative and scalable
technology that addresses one of the challenges above, then it is your moment to
apply!

Networking skills: fun and best practices

Yesterday Mercator Launch and Briskr organised the annual Networking Skills workshop with Frank Stofmeel. This is a fun & hands-on workshop which is very useful for both experienced and inexperienced networkers.

We started off with sharpening our introduction. By trying out in 1 minute, 30 seconds and 10 seconds we learned the key words to stand out from the rest. We then learned how to break into a conversation during networking time, and also how to do that when you are an English speaker and the conversation is in Dutch! Of course, we also learned how to assess whether a conversation is really interesting, whether you have something to gain from each other, and if not, how to subtly get out of the conversation. Or to round up a conversation with a follow-up (coffee, call).

It was great to practise in a ‘safe’ setting and receive customized tips from both Frank and the other entrepreneurs! We look back on a very useful and fun workshop. Thank you for your enthusiasm & inspiration Frank Stofmeel! See you next year!

BANN brings start-ups and investors closer together

The Business Angels Network Nijmegen (BANN) organised a meeting on March 8th. The network, set up a few years ago by Briskr, Oost NL, the municipality of Nijmegen, Rabobank and The Economic Board, is increasingly successful in connecting start-ups and scale-ups with investors. The two initiators, Martijn Kriens from Briskr and Bart Heuts from Oost NL, explain why.

No ATM
“A few years ago we started with the Business Angels Network Nijmegen”, Martijn Kriens, program manager at Briskr, begins his explanation. “You can support start-ups in all sorts of ways and this was happening in the region with knowledge and with loans as funding for the early phase. But there was still a lack of risk capital. That is why we started the Business Angels Network. Angels (potential investors, ed.) are very important for start-ups because of their knowledge and experience.”

Bart Heuts, project manager at Oost NL, adds: “Angels are generally prepared to invest amounts of between 50,000 and 250,000 euros in a company to which they often want to actively contribute themselves with both money and knowledge. The latter is very important; angels are not ATMs. They are all former entrepreneurs with a large network and a lot of entrepreneurial experience that they are happy to share.”

After Rabobank, other companies such as BDO and Poelmann Van den Broek soon joined as supporting partners. Through the network of Oost NL in particular, there are about 150 business angels. The network holds a meeting three times a year at which four start-ups or scale-ups are given a pitch each time.

Read the full article on the website of Lifeport (in Dutch).

New partnership: Brilliant Work

Today, Briskr and Brilliant Work announce a new partnership whereby Brilliant Work will provide support to Briskr start-ups and SMEs towards successful growth. Briskr is a consortium in the Nijmegen area with the aim of helping start-ups and innovative SME’s grow faster and make more impact in the Life Sciences & Health and High Tech sectors. Briskr believes that interaction between knowledge-intensive companies and knowledge institutes, such as universities and government bodies, is essential to realising innovation. Briskr operates in three areas – business support, project and program development for innovation activities and acquisition of innovative companies. In order to support start ups and innovative entrepreneurs, Briskr has brought together a network of companies able and willing to support these innovative companies in their growth.

Brilliant Work is an award winning business coaching, consultancy and training firm, specialised in helping small to medium sized companies grow and professionalise, both on a national and international scale. Most of their coaching engagements are on a subsidised basis, making it very affordable for their clients. Setting up, growing and leading a business is not easy, and Brilliant Work is there to help entrepreneurs and managers to make it easier, more enjoyable and reach their goals faster.

Brilliant Work is a great addition to the list of supporting partners of Briskr. Their expertise and drive in sales and entrepreneurship will help innovative companies in the Nijmegen area. With this addition we expect to further advance the startup eco system in the Nijmegen Area.

Martijn Kriens, program manager of Briskr: “We are happy that Brilliant Work is willing to join our network of services for startups. Broad support in sales and entrepreneurship is often important for startups. Brilliant Work has shown in the past to be able to help focus startups on growth. With the partnership with Brilliant Work we formlize and give shape to our cooperation in this field.”

Lizanne Jakobs, founder of Brilliant Work: “This new partnership is a very positive step foward. For businesses in life science, health and high tech, entrepreneurs have to juggle so many aspects of running a complex company at once. The Dutch eco system is there to help support them, but is not always easy to navigate. By joining forces with Briskr, we are thrilled to fortify the amazing all round support they offer as a consortium, locally, with the right people at the right time.”