Norway Health Tech rank highest among 19 clusters on international relations and export opportunities. This according to a new report written by Menon Economics on behalf of Innovation Norway.
The report shows that 68 per cent of the members of Norway Health Tech state that they gain great value through the cluster’s international activities. It is the highest of all the clusters examined. For the 19 clusters taken as a whole, on average only 37 per cent of the members fully or partially agree that the cluster project provides international relations that the members would otherwise not have had.
– These are very gratifying figures, and show that we are doing well with our international programmes. Now that health has been announced as one of the Government’s new export initiatives, we are well positioned to continue our investment in internationalization in the coming years, says general manager of Norway Health Tech, Lena Nymo Helli.
Fine-tuned export programs
Exports and internationalization are complex, not least in health, where regulations and incentive schemes can be very different from country to country. Building relevant networks and identifying effective meeting places is important. Over many years, Norway Health Tech has gained experience and built a dedicated team that has improved access to international markets. The cluster has been able to prioritize this work, partly thanks to support from Stiftelsen Teknologiformidling.
– In recent years, we have worked in a targeted and structured manner towards key markets in Europe, the USA and South-East Asia, which our members have identified as important focus areas. Our export programs have become more refined as we have gained more experience and a larger network. Now we are really starting to see the effects of this work, through the fact that several of our members are now succeeding in these markets, says head of internationalization at Norway Health Tech, Trine Radmann.
Resource groups and cluster collaboration
As part of the international work, Norway Health Tech has created resource groups for the various markets where the companies meet and exchange experiences, including Germany and Great Britain.
Here are some of Norway Health Tech’s international programs:
USA Next
DMEA – Europe’s largest fair and conferences for digital health
Export resource group Sweden
Norway Health Tech recently entered into a collaboration with the Norwegian Smart Care Cluster to further strengthen access to the international market.
Background:
The cluster program (NIC) aims to contribute to value creation in Norwegian business by triggering, reinforcing and implementing collaborative development. The cluster program has three purposes:
Increase the innovation capacity and value creation in the companies participating in the cluster collaboration
Strengthen the clusters’ role as a facilitator for renewal and growth in Norwegian business
Increase the clusters’ contribution to developing attractive innovation ecosystems regionally and nationally
Altogether, this has resulted in evaluations of 19 clusters and survey data from a total of 700 members in these clusters. In addition, more than 150 in-depth interviews have been conducted with both members and the cluster administrations.
The client, Innovation Norway, has formulated three questions to be answered in the evaluations:
Whether the cluster has so far reached its goals and achieved the desired results and effects through the activities that have been carried out under the auspices of the cluster.
Whether the cluster’s activities, results and effects have contributed to the cluster programme’s overarching goals when the cluster was included in the programme.
To what extent the cluster’s activities and the cluster program’s contribution have been the cause of any documented results and effects.