The European Cluster Alliance is an open platform that was established to maintain a permanent policy dialogue at EU level among national and regional public authorities responsible for developing cluster policies and managing cluster programmes in their countries.

 

The European Cluster Alliance (ECA) was founded in September 2006 by the partners involved in 4 cluster policy projects funded under the PRO INNO Europe initiative of the European Commission: BSR InnoNet, CEE-ClusterNetwork, CLUNET, and INNET. These have all been INNO-Net projects dealing with cluster policy development. ECA was founded to act as the main driver for the further preparation of a strategic agenda on clusters and would be open to other cluster initiatives.

ECA has been welcomed by the Competitiveness Council as in important European initiative to foster cluster cooperation. Among founding ECA members have also been Regional Development Agency of the Ljubljana Urban region (RDA LUR), partner in CLUNET and Maribor Development Agency, partner in CEE-Cluster Network.

ECA is much more than just another cluster networking project. Since January 2008, it is open to external public cluster-relevant organisations in Europe willing to share experiences and to develop joint activities with the other partners of the Alliance.

How is the work organised within the European Cluster Alliance?

The work carried out by the Alliance partners is organised in two different ways: A number of specific activities are carried out by the four projects funded under the PRO INNO Europe initiative, namely the BSR InnoNet, CEE-ClusterNetwork, CLUNET, and INNET. Each project has its own work programme for a period of three years: September 2006 – August 2009.

In addition to this work, the ECA partners have agreed to work together in four horizontal working areas, with a view to jointly developing concrete tools, guides and methodologies of common interest to further advance the quality and impact of their cluster policies and programmes. These working areas include:

·  Measuring the economic impact of cluster policies and programmes, coordinator: BSR InnoNet

·  Identifying financial resources to support cluster policies, coordinator: INNET

·  Improving cluster infrastructure through cluster policy, coordinator:  CLUNET

·  Identifying the main activities of cluster programmes with emphasis on internationalisation, coordinator: CEE-ClusterNetwork

 

Consortium of ECA partners prepared the Final report for each working area. More information on ECA website.

 

RDA LUR took part in the consortium for the working area Improving cluster infrastructure through cluster policy. Final Report