What is OIA?

Alliance col­la­bo­ra­tion has cont­ri­bu­ted to sys­te­ma­tic advance­ment of research, deve­lop­ment and inno­va­tion acti­vi­ties official­ly since 2009, when the first col­la­bo­ra­ti­ve agree­ment of Oulu Inno­va­tion Alliance was sig­ned between rela­ted par­ties. Of cour­se, fruit­ful col­la­bo­ra­tion has long-stan­ding tra­di­tions in Oulu even befo­re this agree­ment.

The sta­ke­hol­ders during the third OIA agree­ment period in 2021–2027 inclu­de the City of Oulu, Uni­ver­si­ty of Oulu, Oulu Uni­ver­si­ty of Applied Sciences, Educa­tio­nal Con­sor­tium OSAO, Natu­ral Resources Ins­ti­tu­te Fin­land, VTT Tech­nical Research Cent­re of Fin­land, Well­being Ser­vices Coun­ty of North Ostro­both­nia, and Tech­no­po­lis. The vision of OIA is to make Oulu the best Euro­pean eco­sys­tem to crea­te glo­bal added value with digi­ta­li­sa­tion.

The main goals set to the col­la­bo­ra­tion wit­hin OIA are

  1. Industry clus­ters and eco­sys­tems crea­te new busi­ness and growth for com­pa­nies
  2. Spear­heads uni­te, deve­lop and revi­se the exper­ti­se in the clus­ters
  3. Invest­ments in the region have inc­rea­sed
  4. Fun­ding for research, deve­lop­ment and inno­va­tion has inc­rea­sed
  5. Prac­tical com­mit­ment of sta­ke­hol­ders is strong, and the network is att­rac­ti­ve and agi­le when it comes to new leads

Stra­te­gic tar­get fields which the alliance part­ners are com­mit­ted to pro­mo­te are

  1. Digi­ta­li­sa­tion in the chan­ging urban envi­ron­ment
  2. Digi­tal solu­tions for health and well-being
  3. Sus­tai­nable clean­tech eco­no­my and clean solu­tions

Also inclu­ded are the cross-cut­ting the­mes: Start-up ent­repre­neurs­hip, Excel­lence and con­ti­nuo­us lear­ning, Crea­tion and sup­port of busi­ness eco­sys­tems, and City as an inno­va­tion plat­form – Oulu Smart City. Pre­pa­ra­tion and prac­tical work has been divi­ded into 11 spear­head pro­gram­mes. Stee­ring of the spear­head pro­gram­mes is distri­bu­ted between the alliance par­ties.

Ouluhealth-ecosystem in chart

Eco­sys­tem agree­ment between the City of Oulu and the sta­te

An eco­sys­tem agree­ment between the City of Oulu and the sta­te on inno­va­tion acti­vi­ties in 2021–2027 cor­res­ponds lar­ge­ly to the Oulu Inno­va­tion Alliance’s stra­te­gy. The Mini­stry of Eco­no­mic Affairs and Emplo­y­ment in Fin­land nego­tia­ted such eco­sys­tem agree­ments with 16 dif­fe­rent city regions for tar­ge­ting public and pri­va­te RDI fun­ding to stra­te­gical­ly selec­ted fields and buil­ding the inter­na­tio­nal brand of Fin­land as a fore­run­ner of tech­no­lo­gical deve­lop­ment, inno­va­ti­ve acqui­si­tions, and trial cul­tu­re.

You can read the agree­ment between the city of Oulu and Mini­stry of Eco­no­mic Affairs and Emplo­y­ment of Fin­land here (PDF file, only in Fin­nish)