On 4 of December 2020, Smart Specialisation Platform (S3P) held the last plenary meeting in the year, in which a representative of the South Transdanubian Regional Innovation Agency was also present.

The S3P assists countries, regions in the EU to improve, accomplish and review their research and innovation strategies for smart specialisation. S3P covers the medical technology sector among others. Therefore, Medtech4 Europe (M4E) project is closely related to S3P just like five project partners participate actively in the platform.

The aim of the meeting was to define the frame of actions for the S3P medtech network for next years. For this purpose, the participants received beforehand a survey regarding the following matters:

  • feedback on past activities of S3P medtech network,
  • discussion on the type of network for the future (regions’ and/or clusters’ network?),
  • discussion on the level of contribution and involvement of members in the facilitation and the actions of the network,
  • definition of the objectives of the network,
  • expected results, actions and deliverables,
  • work methods,
  • launch of working groups,
  • co-investment projects in the pipeline.

The biggest interest was in the question to define the main objectives of the network for the future. The result was obvious. The two main objectives were: identify financial opportunities to support projects at interregional level between partners of the network and build consortia to answer calls.

During the meeting, the assessment was analysed based on the given responses and the members discussed further ideas for the future.

At the end, the S3P made the following conclusions:

  • Managed properly the networking and consortium building in the past.
  • It has a very low impact directly on medtech companies.
  • Members mainly contribute in proposing projects.
  • Meetings should be held three times a year, two in person and one online.
  • Work methods and launch of working groups can be considered, if one of the partners takes the lead for implementation.

The Medtech4 Europe project is co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund and Hungary within the Interreg Europe Programme.