Extremadura Region is committed to a sustainable economic model that supports R+D+I for companies

The High Technology Incubator in Bioeconomy and Circular Economy of Extremadura opens the call for pre-acceleration projects.

The Extremadura Region is committed to a sustainable economic model which is materialised with the creation of the High Technology Incubator in Bioeconomy and Circular Economy (HTI). This is a cutting-edge and benchmark infrastructure for the materialisation of the research-business binomial, the consolidation of new technology-based business projects and the support to green and circular based socio-economic growth.

The HTI is being implemented by a consortium led by the Scientific and Technological Research Center of Extremadura (CICYTEX), a knowledge generating and technology transfer organisation which acts as an infrastructure, promoter and provider of scientific and technological services to the beneficiaries . The consortium is also formed by FUNDECYT-PCTEX and Extremadura AVANTE, responsible for advanced support services for business development and internationalisation of the business projects and incubated companies.

With its implementation, the aim is to modernise the regional productive fabric by improving the competitiveness of the micro-SMEs and technology-based industrial enterprises incubated, as well as to promote the economic transformation of Extremadura towards a development model based on the Bioeconomy and the Circular Economy.

The Incubator could also open up new horizons, among others, like agro-industrial biotechnology, in which Big-Data and bioinformatics are key for the determination of biological patterns or the development of bio-industrial processes.

The HTI will have a usable area of more than 1,000m2 and a total budget of almost 1.5 million euros, which is financed with the support of the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), through the INCYDE Foundation, according to the collaboration agreement signed with the Spanish Chamber of Commerce.

Currently, until 12th February, entrepreneurs, business projects, micro-enterprises and SMEs can submit their initiatives to the call, which will select up to 20 projects to be incorporated into the Incubator's pre-acceleration process.

Thus, the participating projects will be able to validate the different aspects that determine the viability of the future business, aligned with the challenges expressed by Extremadura's agro-industry and aimed at generating products and processes with high added value through new technologies, digitalisation and extraction and purification techniques assisted by biotechnological methods.

In this call, the HTI begins its recruitment of initiatives with market potential and application in industries on the food, pharmacological, cosmetic and chemical sectors, among others, based on Extremadura's natural resources and the use of  by-products, and waste of agro-food industry. The infrastructure is expected to open its doors in mid-2021.

All the information is available on the Incubator's official website (www.iatex.es), where you can also submit your initiative for the call.

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