123rd SPICE Meeting and Special SPICE Workshop in Poznan, Poland

Poznan, Poland
26 – 27 Oct 2006

SPICE Meeting in Poznan, Poland Prior to the Annual Conference of PBICA, Polish Association of Business Incubation and Innovation Centers, a Special SPICE Workshop (and the 124th SPICE Meeting) was held in Poznan, Poland, October 25-26, 2006. This event was hosted by Poznan Science and Technology Park (PSTP, see www.ppnt.poznan.pl/index_uk.php). The day after the workshop the Grand Opening of the new Technology Business Incubator was celebrated with much attention of the media and participation of high level representatives from local and national politics as well as science and business.
Prof. Bogdan Marciniec, Director of the PSTP and Prof. Jacek Gulinski, Vice-Director of PSTP, opened the special SPICE workshop - the first event held in the new business incubator - and welcomed members and guests in Poznan, especially in the technology park. The main topic discussed at the Workshop was "Academic Entrepreneurship". Experts from the SPICE net-work - Raivo Tamkivi, Estonia; Ezzatollah Roustazadeh, Iran; and Krzysztof Zasiadly, Poland - presented views and experi-ences to initiate discussion about projects and plans to foster start-up enterprises from the scientific sector - an issue of increasing importance (not only) in Central and East European countries and especially actual for the new Poznan business incubator. Partici-pants of the workshop from many regions of Poland participated intensively in the discussion and provided much personal experi-ence from practical work. Another topic of the Workshop was "Youth in Innovation, Technology, and Business". SPICE Boy Peter Welburn (UK) introduced to this topic with a presentation prepared together with his daughter Monica who attended the workshop as well. He concluded with a quote by Franz Kafka "Youth is happy because it has the ability to see beauty. Anyone who keeps the ability to see beauty never grows old". There is hope. Discussion on this topic led to many aspects regarding the "coming generation" of innovators, and entrepreneurs aimed at better integrating their views, visions, and interests for analyzing the needs for developing future business incubation initiatives. Following an introduction by Barbara Harley, USA, answers to the "Anniversary Questions" of SPICE Group were summarized and options for publication discussed. Decision on this matter has not yet been taken; however, it seems to be useful to prepare a detailed version of the summary for internal use and an edited shorter version for a wider audience.


Host:
Contact: