There is a number of ingredients required to establish and grow a local entrepreneurial ecosystem. On one side, one of the most important is the proactive role of the public administration in providing an entrepreneurial-friendly territory and legislative tools that can enable this ecosystem; on the other side there is the need of creating a self-sustaining local community by creating awareness through events and meetups.
The Autonomous Province of Trento (Italy) has been investing for the past 30 years on R&D in the ICT sector, investing both in advanced Research Centers and a University ranking among top ones in Italy for ICT; moreover, since 2012 Trento hosts the 6th node of the European Institute of Technology – ICT Labs.
Trento RISE was founded in 2011 with the mission of bridging the gap between Education, Research and Business. TechPeaks – The People Accelerator – is one of the flagship programs of Trento RISE with the goal of enabling the creation of a local startup ecosystem which can tap into the technological know-how produced by Trentino research centers and university by also attracting international talents to Trento.
The creation of an innovative acceleration program such as TechPeaks and the operation of making Trentino attractive for both international entrepreneurs and investors poses a number of challenges: from the political & legal point of view, to the cultural mindset of local companies & institutions.
Paolo Lombardi is Manager of New Business Creation at Trento Rise (www.trentorise.eu), the Italian research-education core partner of the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT) ICT Labs (www.eitictlabs.eu). A former experienced researcher in Artificial Intelligence in Italian and French Universities and at the European Commission, Paolo is a Fulbright BEST scholar in Technology Entrepreneurship in Silicon Valley, and has been involved in technology transfer through means of startups since 2008, and on startup community building since 2010. He is co-founder and micro-angel investor in two companies in human language technologies and mobile gaming. Currently he is managing director of TechPeaks, the People Accelerator, the new public and international accelerator program for ICT start-ups based in Trento, Italy (techpeaks.eu).
