CORA and COM³ partners met in Lincoln, UK to share project results and future activities. Mission: helping municipalities, regions, and business support organisations fight the digital divide in rural areas. Interactive sessions, workshops, field trips and more were on the agenda!
On 22-24 November 2022, the University of Lincoln hosted a joint partner meeting of Interreg projects CORA and COM³, as well as a regional conference.
On 22 November 2022, a formal CORA partner meeting was held in the Cathedral visitor centre. Partners discussed the CORA workshop series and the next steps in the digital rural journey. In the evening, all partners were invited to join a spooky tour of the atmospheric uphill area of Lincoln after dark.
On 23 November 2022, CORA and COM³ visited the Lincoln Cathedral as well as the Mosaic Digital Hub. Mosaic is a co-working space developed for digital businesses, in the heart of the city centre. It officially opened in November 2019 and has been developed collaboratively by the digital community in Lincoln, working together with Lincolnshire Co-op and Lincolnshire County Council. The building offers a variety of spaces designed with growing tech and digital firms in mind. Mosaoic counts currently around 60 members.
The tech industry is a growing sector in Lincolnshire. And freelancers and businesses need a space to innovate and meet.
COM³ partners were all amazed by the success story of the COM³ pilot in Lincolnshire, the “UoL4.0 Challenge”, that brings students, businesses and government together to tackle digital challenges.
In the afternoon, COM³ partners met to share the latest updates about selected pilots (Oldambt, Vinje, Vejle, and Torsby). Partners also discussed the future COM³ support model.
On 24 November 2022, COM³ partners discussed how to disseminate the COM³ findings. The University of Lincoln presented the methodology and survey to measure the impact of COM³ on regional companies. The survey campaign will start in January 2023.
Next steps: COM³ partners are busy developing new training modules to support municipalities, regions and business support organisations tech-enable small companies. They will also finalise the COM³ support model, a visualised tool for local and regional actors in rural areas who want to improve the tech adoption of companies in their region.
