Good preparation for public events is the main factor in their successful conduct and results. UCA positions a series of meetings with international partners on August 27-29 in Lviv and Kyiv as the most important international event of the year in Ukraine. This publication is prepared for our ambassadors of the Professionals4Ukraine program and answers questions about the events’ context and their goals.

Possible goals — experience and lessons of the Lviv Conference 2023

The first question about possible goals might take into account the experience of the Lviv Conference 2023 which was quite similar. Then, thanks to our ambassadors from Poland, it attracted more than 40 foreign guests from 3 countries (overall 150), and had excellent feedback from both the domestic audience and foreign partners. The main results at the moment are the following.

• The Polish delegation, led by the Lesser Poland Voivodeship and the Kraków clusters, responded with a similar invitation: In September 2023, the UCA study tour took place together with the Ministry of Economy to the innovation ecosystems of Rzeszów and Kraków, and we also took part in the international forum in Krynica. The organizers were joined by the Polish state agency Industry 4.0 – FPPP. 
• Over the past year, we have significantly strengthened cooperation with Polish actors – such as the Lesser Poland Voivodeship, FPPP, Krakow Technology Park, Clusters of Composite Materials and Sustainable Infrastructure. With the latter, we applied to 2 consortia in June of this year for the EU-UA clusters partnership call.
• The Composite materials cluster from Kraków (headed by Andrzej Czulak) took over the young Lviv CAMT cluster, which was also created under the conference’s influence. They already had several invitations for exchanges in Poland and Germany.
• Lviv’s conference united the two strong ecosystems of Lviv and Kyiv of “Quantum Technologies.” Later, this united team became the basis of the UCA delegation to the Warsaw conference in March 2024, where UCA was a co-organizer together with the clusters of Germany, Poland, and France. OptecBB’s Mike Richardson played a key role in the organization and engagement.
• Separately, in this context, it is worth noting Mike Richardson’s tour of 5 cities in Ukraine last year. To a certain extent, the origins of this also lie in the formation of UCA clusters at the Lviv conference.

It worth to mention as well separate commercial agreements of visit the Horodok Industrial Park, the opening of the APPAU office in the Kraków Technology Park, and the Ukrainian delegation’s trip to the ‘Clusters meet regions’ in Kraków in December 2023. Other exchanges should be added to this. All these are echoes of the Lviv Conference 2023.

In summary, the Lviv conference, which took place just three months after the first meeting of the UCA with Polish clusters in Košice, vividly demonstrated the potential of cooperation between EU and Ukrainian clusters. It is obvious that this was only the beginning, but it requires continuation and expansion of the topics of cooperation, also with other countries.

Context and goals for 2024

Considering last year’s experience, other exchanges and the development of relations with our ambassadors, what should be considered in preparing for August 27-29? A number of factors shape the communication and program context and, accordingly, affect our common goals and objectives.

1)     Restructuring and changes in UCA. UCA today is no longer the organization that foreign partners saw in Košice or Lviv in 2023. UCA has become more organized, structured, and strong in many ways, and new leaders have also appeared. Here are some facts that give ideas to our foreign partners about areas of possible cooperation

• Rapid growth and development: After the initial restructuring in December 2023, when the alliance was reduced from 60 to 24 organizations, UСA continues to grow with the “right” clusters—today, the organization includes 39 cluster organizations.
• New projects – UCA clusters were included in 5 EDIHs out of 12 officially recognized by the European Commission in July. This means that the subject of EDIH has already entered the agenda of the entire UCA. Similar changes are taking place in the direction of European cooperation (we look forward to the results of the EU-Ukraine clusters partnership round, where there will be 6 winners)
• 2 wins in Interreg Europe Accelerate GDT and DanubIA – not only expands our funding opportunities, it is also a direct path to better cross-border cooperation with regional partners 
• Three new big initiatives of international cooperation—Clusters4Defense, Clusters4Energy, and Clusters4ReskillUA—respectively aim to consolidate EU-UA clusters in the areas of Dual-use/MilTech, Green Energy, and Reskilling-Upskilling. The Ukrainian government, the European Commission, and a number of international organizations, donors, etc., are focusing on all three topics. UCA needs to initiate significant partner exchanges to shape and concretize our proposals.

2)     Today, we are much more aware of the common challenges in all relevant communities, both our own, cluster and partner, which work to support SMEs

•        Project-oriented approach (short-term) vs mechanism-oriented (long-term): most European clusters are oriented to cooperation on projects where there is funding. And these are usually pan-European programs, where the principle is simple – “first find funding, then you can talk about cooperation.” We, of course, respect this approach and support it ourselves. But, in fact, the experience of the UCA and our needs also appeal to the need to increase long-term cooperation mechanisms

•        The UCA project itself (as the National Association of Clusters) is nothing more than a mechanism for the long-term development of clusters

•        Similarly, the Professionals4Ukraine program is not about money for 6 or 12 months; it is about developing bi-multilateral cooperation for years. And it already partially works!

•        Our initiatives to create new formats of the Clusters Partnership for Ukraine (which is not at all what was with the EaP) are also about mechanisms

•        The Clusters4Defense, Clusters4Energy, and Clusters4ReskillUA initiatives are similarly about 5-7 year programs, and each with its own portfolio of projects

Awareness of this difference, forming of appropriate messages and initiatives are extremely important for the entire Professionals4Ukraine community.

•        The leadership challenges (on both sides) are really big. The past two years have clearly shown that cooperation initiatives are implemented only when they are led and supported by true leaders who know how to organize teams, acquire resources, coordinate project activities at the international level, form strong messages, and communicate them to key stakeholders. We critically lack such leaders on both sides.

•        We need to continue supporting the exchange of best practices and perhaps making it more effective. For example, it is now clearly visible how, under the slogan of transferring experience, some donors repeat the same practice of copy-past from Western practices or just “teaching us”. A real, live exchange is needed, which includes, among other things, powerful communication with foreign partners of the Ukrainian experience, but even more of our challenges because the situation in Ukraine is unique today in many dimensions.

•        Joint preparation for Recovery programs is also an obvious challenge. There was and still is a lot of talk about these programs, but if you look at where we have really progressed in them, especially in clusters cooperation with foreign partners, the progress is quite insignificant.

3)     The state of relations with P4U ambassadors and discourses with cluster communities of Central and Eastern European countries. The protracted war in Ukraine is tiring, uncertainty is growing, and there are no effective mechanisms for getting out of this situation. Accordingly, –

•        On the PRO side, we see a significantly larger number of consortia and initiatives for individual projects and programs offered in the EU under the grants of Euro-programs. In other words, we try to get the most out of what we can with our partners.

•        On the CON, these programs (10+) create a very fragmented and ultimately highly competitive environment with virtually no regional or other coordination. This is also a consequence of the lack of mechanisms for long-term cooperation, especially for cluster associations and bi-multilateral policymaker programs.

•        As part of the ClusterINT project, we see numerous difficulties in launching bilateral committees. The very complex logistics of travel to Ukraine negatively affect the motivation of our numerous partners to enter the format of permanent cooperation.

So, what does all of this mean for our clusters and coordinators of UCA, as well as for several engaged ambassadors of the Professionals4Ukraine program? Here are 3 main takeaways

1. Focus on cooperation projects: UCA prepares proposals for priority projects in all key areas of activity. Similarly, we expect their offers from foreign partners.
2. Leadership in international cooperation: UCA gives the green light to all ambassadors who are ready to lead this or that direction of cooperation. We already have such vivid examples – Mike Richardson is already running the Clusters4Defense program, Tereza Shamanova leads exchanges of EDIHs and general CZ-UA live exchanges, Adrian Jasik has taken over the leadership of the transfer of the best practices of Polish Industry 4.0 to Ukraine, Andrzej Chulak – supervises the development of a separate young cluster from Lviv, Florian Andrews is the main consultant in formation of educational programs for clusters of UCA. And so on, this list is not complete. It is about scaling and strengthening similar initiatives in other directions. Each of the Professionals4Ukraine ambassadors can be a leader in cooperation with clusters of UCA in their country, segment, or field of action.
3. Balance “project approach vs long-term mechanisms”. We should especially emphasize the need for long-term mechanisms in discussions and exchanges. We should set as a goal the appearance of these mechanisms in the Facility plan with its billions of euros of aid to Ukraine. We need long-term programs to support clusters of Ukraine, initiatives such as Clusters4Defese and Clusters4Energy, Clusters4ReskillsUA, development of regional initiatives, etc. Events in Lviv and Kyiv are a great opportunity to voice these messages.

How to implement these approaches – UCA committee is developing a detailed implementation plan, and we will announce the content of individual sections and parts of the program in meetings before the events on August 27-29.

We really appreciate the arrival of our numerous people in Ukraine ambassadors from Poland, Germany, France and Romania. After all, the trip’s logistics are very complicated and take a lot of time.  For those colleagues who cannot hide, there is an opportunity to join online. 

UCA welcomes proposals for cooperation from our ambassadors. Together, we will be able to form development vectors and goals for the second half of 2024 and 2025. 

See you in Lviv and Kyiv.

The executive directorate of the Ukrainian Cluster Alliance.