TCI Special Interest Group on Internationalisation

The first meeting of the TCI Special Interest Group on Internationalisation (TCI SIG-I) took place on 27 January 2009 in Stuttgart, Germany under the patronage of the TCI German Contact Point, ZENIT GmbH and MFG Baden Württemberg, who organised a kick-off workshop and a first exchange of experiences on the topic of internationalisation of clusters.

In the beginning, the 26 participants mainly exchanged their views on and experiences with internationalisation of clusters. It became clear that first of all a common definition of internationalisation of clusters has to be found. Do we talk about the internationalisation of single actors within a cluster or do we mean by internationalisation of clusters that a cluster as a brand establishes contacts abroad?

Yet, as a cluster is only succesful by satisfying the needs of the cluster actors, it was agreed that internationalisation of clusters means both: supporting cluster actors in their attempt to internationalise as well as the internationalisation of the cluster management itself.

In the afternoon session, two working groups were made up in order to discuss succesful instruments for the internationalisation of clusters.

4 steps have been made up:

1) Raising awareness: Analysis of target markets, Sensibilisation of companies

2) Initiation: Benchmarking, Establishment of international contacts

3) Implementation: Cooperation activities

4) Follow-up: Sustainability, Financing.

Second meeting of the group took place in July 2009, exploring furthger challenges and possibilities of internationalisation of clusters.

If you are interested in more detailed information on the TCI Special Interest Group on Internationalisation, please contact info@tci-network.de.