Awards recognise European cluster excellence in 2020

Submitted by Lee Gibson on 16 November 2020

European Clusters Alliance president Antonio Novo Guerrero has been honoured with a special award at the European Cluster Conference 2020.

Mr Novo, who is manager of Cluster IDiA in Spain, received a Special Award for EU Cluster Mobilisation for his work during the COVID-19 pandemic, which included setting up the European Alliance Against Coronavirus.

During one of the highlights of the two-day event, which was held entirely online for the first time, the award was announced by Ulla Engelmann, Head of Unit for Advanced Technologies, Clusters and Social Economy at the European Commission’s Directorate-General for the Internal Market, Industry, Entrepreneurship and SMEs.

“Antonio has managed to mobilise the cluster community during the COVID-19 crisis, organising daily webinars from the beginning of the crisis and creating the European Alliance Against Coronavirus,” she said. “This has shown how the power of clusters for reaching out can be used.”

“I’m really moved by this recognition and very proud of what we have been able to do together,” said Mr Novo. “This is really a shared recognition of all the contributors to the actions taken by the European Clusters Alliance and European Alliance Against Coronavirus.”

Ms Engelmann also presented awards for the Cluster Manager of the Year and Cluster Partnership of the Year 2020, which this year focused on the communications aspects of cluster management and partnerships.

The Cluster Manager of the Year Award went to Uwe Pfeil of the E-Mobility and IT-Logistics clusters in Germany.

Conference attendees voted for the winner of this award after hearing short presentations from three shortlisted candidates.

Mr Pfeil said: “I am personally very honoured to be elected as European Cluster Manager 2020, but it is also a special award for the whole cluster team and proof of the excellent cluster policy of Regensburg.”

The final award was for the European Cluster Partnership of the Year, which went to the INNOSUP-1 project IoT4Industry.

Project coordinator Marielle Campanella said: “This award is attributed to the entire IoT4Industry consortium. It is valuable recognition of the intensive and efficient work that has been carried out by the project partners.”

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