Matosinhos City Council will allocate 10,000 euros to businesses that boost the blue economy
Matosinhos City Council will allocate 10,000 euros to businesses that boost the blue economy
Applications for the 3rd edition of BluAct are open until November 5th and seek to encourage the growth of blue economy startups
Matosinhos City Council promotes, in partnership with UPTEC – Science and Technology Park of U. Porto, the 3rd edition of BluAct, a programme to support the growth of the blue economy that seeks startups with innovative business ideas, mainly that presents solutions with an impact on the sustainability of the water sector and the canning industry.
By participating in this edition of BluAct, the selected startups will benefit from a mentoring programme to support the development of the business model and preparation for the presentation of business projects at the final event.
All ideas and/or business projects related to fishing, processing, conservation and marketing of fish can compete for the programme; aquaculture, bioresources and blue biotechnology; ports, transport and logistics; naval industries and marine energies; nautical and nautical tourism, as long as they affect the economy of the sea.
For the first-place winner, a prize is expected to be awarded by the company Indaqua-Matosinhos with a maximum financial value of 5,000 euros, and for the project that demonstrates the greatest impact on the canning industry, promoting the circular economy and sustainability, a prize is expected to be awarded by the company Conservas Portugal Norte for a monetary value of 2,500 euros. The winners will also be able to benefit from a year of incubation at UPTEC Mar and participation in the business acceleration program promoted by UPTEC, and will be exempt from Forum Oceano membership fees for the first two years.
The program for this edition of BluAct was presented on the morning of October 9th, at UPTEC Mar, in a presentation ceremony that was attended by the Vice-President of the Matosinhos City Council, Carlos Mouta, and the Business Development Director of UPTEC , Maria Moura Oliveira.
For the vice-president of the Matosinhos City Council , Carlos Mouta, BluAct is the seed launch for several projects looking for a projection platform. “There is a strong and natural connection between these themes and the geography of Matosinhos, which has been next to the sea for many hundreds of years. The big challenge is how we transform what was the reality of a fishing and industrial community into what is the future, which is the production of new sustainable services and products, linked to the use of algae, wind, sun, energy waves, among many others, and being able to create value and accommodate these ideas for the industrial sector, for the Academy, is what we want to do with BluAct”.
In turn, Maria Oliveira shared that UPTEC’s dynamics with CM Matosinhos and with the partners of this program are fundamental to the future success of these companies. “It is extremely important to understand that we are contributing to the objective of creating innovative projects that are linked to issues of sustainability and the preservation of our oceans and natural resources. This partnership with the Matosinhos City Council, which is now in its third year, turns out to be extremely important, to solidify all this support that we can give to new projects”.
The winning startups of the 2022 edition of BluAct – FilterCork, Inclita Seaweed Solutions and Windcredible, shared their past experiences in the programme, before the networking session that closed the ceremony.
This initiative aims to promote the creation of qualified jobs, boosting the blue economy of the municipality of Matosinhos.
Applications must be submitted by November 5, 2023, by filling out this form.
October 9th 2023