30 European SMEs supported, 230 B2B meetings arranged, 4 international trade missions, 6 blue growth sectors, 314 additional SMEs benefitted, 40 assisted events; these are the impressive figures coming out of the Space2Waves project as it comes to a close after 24 months. These results are especially welcome given the challenge of developing and implementing an internationalisation programme for European SMEs during the worldwide Covid pandemic!

The Space2Waves project has successfully connected the 30 selected European SMEs offering innovative Earth Observation technologies and services with 230 SMEs, universities, national and regional authorities, government departments, multinational organisations, business clusters, innovation hubs and research networks across the four target markets of Australia, Canada, South Africa and the UAE.

The project team was forced to creatively adapt its planned activities and develop new ways to support the SMEs in an online capacity as a result of the pandemic. A total of 314 SMEs interacted with the project benefitting from the over 40 training sessions, webinars on the various markets and Blue Growth sectors and matchmaking and other activities during the two year project. An encouraging spin-off has been a number of collaborations between the 30 supported SMEs to develop products and services together and in some cases the formation of consortiums to tackle joint projects in the target countries.

Space2Waves partners organised and accompanied the selected SMEs on Trade Missions to the UAE, to coincide with Water Week; Canada, to visit the H2O Conference; Australia to meet with various agencies and a virtual matchmaking event for the South African market. Details and reports from the trade missions can be viewed here.

Commenting on the programme, LS Engineering from Portugal commented, “We were very pleased to participate in Space2Waves. During the programme we have learnt about the latest developments in the blue economy and space opportunities including the main actors and investment opportunities in Australia. During our Trade Mission we had the opportunity to establish really useful contacts with businesses, organisations and relevant programmes. We were very pleased with the assistance we received and the organisation of the various events throughout Space2Waves. We look forward to similar initiatives in the future.”

As the Space2Waves project comes to a successful conclusion, the SpaceWave Alliance, which was started during an earlier SpaceWaves project, will continue the support and development of European Earth Observation (EO) technologies in the Blue Economy. The Alliance comprises of the 6 project partners and aims to engage in a number of activities to continue to develop the internationalisation of European SMEs via a number of initiatives beyond the end of the project. For more information on the SpaceWave Alliance click here or contact space2waves@polemermediterranee.com