Organisation and activities

From January 2010, and for the next three years, the European Cluster Alliance will be managed as part of the new INNO-Net cluster project called TACTICS funded by DG Industry and Entrepreneurship, and led by OSEO (France) in cooperation with six other innovation agencies. In the framework of this project, the secretariat of the European Cluster Alliance will be managed by inno TSD, a consultancy company, which will be the main contact for its current and future members. OSEO, as the TACTICS project coordinator, will be in charge of the animation of the European Cluster Alliance and be supported by this dedicated project Secretariat. In addition to the open platform exchange, a minimum of two events will take place annually, gathering the European Cluster Alliance members to discuss and exchange ideas on selected topics.

The ECA will work closely with other European cluster networks such as the ECO (European Cluster Observatory) and other Europe INNOVA initiatives as well as the ECPG (European Cluster Policy Group) (seen below). Moreover, the ECA will seek to develop close links with other European or national level projects and programmes involved or interested in cluster policies: current Regions of Knowledge projects (DG Research) and INTERREG projects (DG Regio). Finally, the scope for developing links with other pan European networks or organisations such as TAFTIE (the European network of 23 national innovation agencies), Eurada or “meta cluster networks” will be actively explored.