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About EBN and the BICs

About the BICS
European Community Business & Innovation Centres – or EC BICs as they are officially known – are support organisations for innovative small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) and entrepreneurs. They are recognised by the European Commission through a quality certification scheme, which enables them to obtain the European "EC-BIC" label.

Global mission
BICs are business and innovation support instruments assisting regional and local economic development. Their role is to support the creation of new innovative firms and to help existing firms to modernise and innovate, throughout a complete set of incubation services within an internationalisation context.

Core business services
The pillars of BICs' services are:

  • the promotion of entrepreneurship
    • the pro-active detection of innovative projects (individual and collective projects from entrepreneurs, SMEs and researchers)
    • strategic guidance before, during and after start-up phase (incubation and follow-up)
      • during incubation (risk analysis, business planning support, mentoring, access to financing)
      • follow-up after creation (post incubation) with a focus on financial engineering and hands-on strategic guidance and operational support
  • providing innovative firms with physical incubation facilities and related services
  • supporting innovative firms in the internationalisation process
  • providing innovative firms with technological and marketing assistance
  • academic spin-off and industrial spin-out engineering
  • organising training courses for innovative entrepreneurs
  • supporting co-operation (including clustering) between innovative firms
  • sign-posting towards existing service providers and other support organisations, as well as the building of an external talent pool are recommended


The European networking dimension
EC BICs are collectively represented by EBN, the European BIC Network, based in Brussels, whose aim is to develop, co-ordinate and promote the growth of the BIC network within and outside the European Union. Since its creation in 1984, EBN has grown substantially and there are now 160 BICs (full members) in 21 countries as well as 60 additional associate members who share the same objective of SME support and development.

News
FP7 3rd Call for proposals- Positioning, Navigation and Timing applications
01/09/2010
The European GNSS Supervisory Authority (GSA)-on behalf of the European Commission- has just launched the 3rd call for proposals for Positioning and Navigation Applications in the frame of EU's FP7.
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ESA-ESINET Road show with TecknowMetrix, 7 October 2010, Grenoble (F)
01/09/2010
TecknowMetrix, in partnership with ESA and EBN, will hold its road show in Grenoble, next October, 7th.
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NAPEOS Training Course Announcement
31/08/2010
PosiTim, a start-up company under ESA Business Incubation, is organising the first ever NAPEOS GNSS Software training course.
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ESA Road show 2010: the new season is starting! WSLlux, 23 September, Transinne (BE)
09/08/2010
The European Space Agency will meet space-connected stakeholders on September 23rd in Transinne (Belgium). This event is organised by the Incubator WSLlux, in partnership with ESA and EBN, in the aim to promote the huge potentials offered by space related technologies as well as space applications products and services.


The detailed agenda will come soon.
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ESA Investment Forum: 5 October 2010, Milan
30/07/2010
Organised by ESA’s Technology Transfer Programme Office (TTPO) in collaboration with Europe Unlimited, the ESA Investment Forum 2010 follows the previous and highly successful editions taking place at the EuropeSpace Research and Technology Centre (ESTEC) in the Netherlands and in La Hulpe, Belgium.


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UAV Show Europe, 15-16 September Bordeaux-Mérignac Aéroparc (France)
14/06/2010
On 15th and 16th September 2010, Bordeaux Technowest Aéroparc organises the frist European affairs convention on UAV: the UAV Show Europe 2010.
UAV SHOW EUROPE is the first affairs convention among all actors from the UAV sector at the international level, with the objective to link supply and demand.
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European competition seeks best satnav ideas
12/05/2010
Entrepreneurs have the chance to win prizes totalling a million euros in this year's European Satellite Navigation Competition. ESA will award a special prize of €10 000 EUR the best idea and support the business start up at one of its four incubation centres.
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GATE: The German GALILEO Test and Development Environment
14/04/2010
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ESA Business Incubation - Applications OPEN #23
28/10/2009
The deadline to submit proposals is on Tuesday, 3rd November 2009.
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NAVTEQ LBS Challenge EMEA - Register Now
28/10/2009
EMEA Deadline Extended to November 6, 2009

The competition is open to pre-commercialized applications for any platform and device.
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ESA Investment Forum, 7th April 2009, La Hulpe (Belgium)
20/04/2009
ESA Investment Forum (EIF) – 36 companies attended the event, including 6 companies within KIS4SAT. Capital High Tech and HBIC were the KIS4SAT experts invited for the event.
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ESA Business Incubation Centres
14/04/2009
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ESINET - JOB Opportunities
14/04/2009
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  EBN
Avenue de Tervueren, 168 B - 1150 Brussels
T�l. : +32 2 772 89 00
Fax : +32 2 772 95 74
Email : esinet@ebn.be
The ESINET Network is supported by the European Space Agency
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