Green Growth & Cleantech Summit brought together over 600 top influencers
The Green Growth & Cleantech Summit 25.2.2014 in Helsinki brought together over 600 top Finnish influencers and experts. Tekes’ Green Growth programme, coordinated by Spinverse, was one of the main partners of the event.
One of the key themes of the event was scarcity of resources as a global challenges and the opportunities that this opens to Finnish players. Awareness of environmental issues is rapidly increasing also in emerging markets. Can Finnish players take advantage of this and what does it require from the companies as well as from the innovation system?
These topics were discussed in a panel with opening speech from Pekka Lundmark, CEO of Konecranes. The discussion was moderated by Director General Pekka Soini of Tekes. The panelists were Tero Ojanperä of Vision+ Fund, Sampo Ahonen of Beneq and Santtu Hulkkonen of Solved, the Cleantech Company.
Opportunities in combining cleantech and digitalization
In addition to technological innovation, green growth requires new business and service models, as well as abilities to operate in global value networks. As example of a huge new opportunity is the “industrial internet” which enables machines to become connected and aware of their own state in a totally new way. This opens up such immense possibilities to develop new services that the industrial internet may even be a driver for the next industrial revolution.
Co-creation as key to growth
The Finnish cleantech sector is growing rapidly (15% annual growth in 2012, according to a survey done by Cleantech Finland). One of the challenges, however, is the width of the cleantech SME sector. The sector’s export is heavily dependent on large companies, and global markets require comprehensive solutions. By supporting joint company projects, including cooperation between small and large companies, it is possible to establish new business models and this way create comprehensive solutions to major environmental challenges.
According to a survey conducted by the Tekes Green Growth programme, Finnish cleantech SMEs are most interested in the European, Chinese and Russian markets. “We are doing hands-on work to support these companies. For example, we are currently running an initiative to build Finnish-Russian cooperation in the area of modern waste management. Especially the emerging markets are challenging, but by joining forces Finnish companies have better chances to leverage the opportunities”, says the Green Growth programme’s coordinator Dr Laura Juvonen of Spinverse.
See Kauppalehti’s article 25.2. Lundmark: Valtavia liiketoimintamahdollisuuksia