Living Labs: Accelerating Foodtech Innovation and Ecosystem Growth

Living Labs: pillar of a Strong Foodtech Innovation Ecosystem

In the world of food-tech innovation, living labs play a crucial role. Living labs foster collaboration among stakeholders by engaging multiple perspectives and accelerating innovation processes. This not only increases the success rate of innovations but also ensures they align more closely with market demands. These are some of the reasons why the European Food-scalEUp project is delving deeper into the world of food-tech living labs.

Real-Life Environment

A living lab, which activities can also take shape in a field lab or technology center,  is a real-life environment where businesses, knowledge institutions and other stakeholders collaborate to test innovations such as new technologies, products, and services. The real-world conditions allow ideas to be validated and optimized. The insights gained through co-creation thus enhance the development of new technologies and greatly increase the chances of successful application.

Strengthening Agrifood Innovation Ecosystems

Within Food-scalEUp, clusters and regions across Europe collaborate to optimize services for agrifood and tech startups as they scale up. The goal is to develop robust, region-specific acceleration programs tailored to the needs of startups and scaleups.

How do living labs strengthen regional food-tech ecosystems?

• Living labs involve end users directly in the development process, resulting in products and services that better meet market demands, increasing the likelihood of successful innovations.
• Living labs bring together a wide array of stakeholders involved in innovations, such as businesses, governments, research institutions, citizens, and other parties. This multidisciplinary collaboration fosters knowledge exchange, creates synergies, and strengthens the innovation ecosystem.
• The involvement of different stakeholders entails an iterative process.
• Innovations tested and validated in living labs have a higher likelihood of adoption by users, allowing for faster scaling.
• Living labs are region-specific, familiar with local opportunities, challenges, and contexts.
• By considering social and environmental factors, living labs help develop more sustainable and inclusive innovations, contributing to a more resilient innovation ecosystem.

 

Opportunities and Challenges

Over the past few years, numerous Living Lab initiatives have emerged across Europe, including in the field of food tech. To gain better insight into these developments and explore the opportunities and challenges of living labs for food-tech startup acceleration programs, AgriFood Capital organized two webinars in 2024 for Food-scalEUp and other interested partners. These webinars provided valuable insights, fresh ideas, and new opportunities for collaboration among clusters and regions, making it easier for food-tech entrepreneurs to innovate.

Lessons Learned

• Living Lab Methodology: Co-creation and design thinking ensure the inclusion of all stakeholders involved. This helps advance innovation by asking the right questions in complex areas.
• Regional Focus: While the principles behind living labs are often universal, they must be adapted to the local context and focus. As Dr. Ákos Szépvölgyi (CTRIA, Hungary) emphasized, engagement with regional government and local businesses operates differently in the Netherlands than in Hungary. A well-thought-out governance structure is essential for successful collaboration.
• Trust, Openness, and Collaboration: Last but not least, living labs revolve around trust, openness, and collaboration. We can only solve today's complex problems by working together. In a living lab, diverse perspectives come together, allowing for a holistic problem-solving approach. This doesn’t happen automatically and requires new methods to help organizations unfamiliar with such collaboration to work together. Clear definition of roles and processes is crucial for effective functioning of living labs and building trust among stakeholders.

Importance of a Long-Term Strategy

As we are just at the beginning of creating our living lab on natural products, the involvement of players from established living labs and the presentation of their activities helped us better organize and plan our project. Thanks to the webinars, we discovered the ENoLL methodology and realized the importance of having a strong vision and long-term strategy for our living lab. Martin was also very available to support us and answer our questions.”
— Sara Aibeche, Innovation Manager on Product Performance and Consumer Approach - Innov’Alliance

What’s next?

The Food-scalEUp project is coming to an end this year. However, the partners will continue to build on the knowledge and experiences gained in supporting startups, the role of living labs, and the development of region-specific innovation networks in Europe within the Smart Sensors 4 AgriFood (SS4AF) network.

This will happen, for example, through SIXFOLD. This new European project within the SS4AF partnership, focuses on the further development of living labs and the barriers hindering food-tech innovation. Like Food-scalEUp, the partners in SIXFOLD will also learn from the experiences and best practices of clusters and regions.

Living labs form a strong pillar of a strong innovation ecosystem. They offer services that help startups and SMEs innovate better, faster, and more successfully. By developing a network of living labs / integrating living labs into the innovation ecosystem, startups throughout Europe can receive tailor made support they need to grow into successful enterprises. In this way, clusters and regions will continue to work towards a sustainable, future-proof food system in Europe.