Innovation & digital transition

Since 2000, Lille Metropole has had  all the economic development competencies  transfered from its municipalities :

• Support to companies and entrepreneurship
• Support to innovation, digitalisation, design and clustering
• Social economy policy
• Support to employment
• Development and maintenance of industrial, business, science & technology and retail parks
• Development of industrial and tertiary real estate and incubators

Lille Metropole economic policies interests:

• Smart cities, digital innovation, 5G, ...
• Local industry, entrepreneurship, ..., COSME 
• R&D&I : Horizon Europe, Digital Europe, EDIH, ...
• Social economy : ESER programme, ...

Euratechnologies

With 300 companies established there and more than 4500 employees, Euratechnologies is one of the biggest digital hubs in France, working on a wide range of subjects such as Cybersecurity, Internet of Things (IoT), Big Data, Enterprise software.

Euratechnologies is also a perfect example of Lille Metropole's industrial transition and of its adaptability, transforming a 19th century textile factory closed since 1989 into a globally renown digital ecosystem at the forefront of technology, with the support of European regional funding.   

3 other digital hubs have spinned off from Euratechnologies : BlancheMaille, in Roubaix, dedicated to digital E-commerce, Agrotech in Willem, focused on digital technologies for agriculture and Euratech in Saint Quentin, specialized of digitalisation of industry (Robotics, automation, ...) 

For more information, click here 

So Mel So Connected

The So Mel, So Connected project carries Lille metropole ambitions in terms of digitalisation, with a project aiming at experimenting innovative business models, backed by the deployment of Smart Grids functionalities in an urban environment.

The Smart grid systems help optimize the territory's energy distribution networks and will allow the mutualization of every important energetic projects. It is part of a large-scale generalization of Smart Grids solutions around individual self-consumption, the valorisation of local energy potentials, the deployment of EVSE (Electric Vehicule Supply Equipments) and combined approaches to energy planning and social cohesion.

Lille Metropole digital app

In order to connect Lille metropole citizens to each others and improve their daily interactions with public facilities, Lille Metropole has developed several applications in order to connect the inhabitants with their local surroundings.

For instance, the MELcome app can inform Lille Metropole inhabitants on more than 20 thematics (public transports, cultural sites) in real time. Linked with Lille Metropole Open Agenda, the application users can be informed of every events taking place in the territory. 

Enjoy MEL is another application displaying every facility available to the user in daily life themes such as health, market, etc

Moreover, in order to make every important information on Lille Metropole action available to every citizen, an Open portal data has been created, where every data on the urban region can be found.   

EYES - Empowering Youth through Entrepreunarial Skills - Interreg North-West Europe

In NWE, 14% of young people aged 15-34 years are not in employment, education or training (NEET). Since NEETs are rather irresponsive to classic top-down approaches and hardly connect to existing support schemes they bear the risk of long term labour market exclusion.

To make a real difference, a transfer of knowledge is needed to generate a new, transnational model. The co-designed EYES approach combines entrepreneurial education with personal coaching and a digital platform to help NEETs access regular support schemes they otherwise would refuse.

Of the 100 000 NEETS in five NWE metropolitan areas, EYES will reach 1 000 during the project lifetime. 400 of them will use regular support schemes while 25 will even become early-stage entrepreneurs.

Project partners : Stadt Herne, Gemeente Tilburg, JES stadslabo, Royal Borough of Greenwich, …

For more information, click here

Fast to Market - Interreg France-Wallonie-Vlaanderen

The FAST TO MARKET project aims to promote the marketing of innovative products and services.

The project is aimed at project leaders as well as young and growing companies. It focuses on the profiles of priority companies for the development of the Franco-Walloon zone: companies with high and median potential (job creation, innovation) active in strategic sectors of activity.

Thanks to this programme, Lille Métropole has seen the development of its network of economic players on a cross-border scale, thanks to a better knowledge of the Belgian market through active collaboration with Belgian professionals.

Project partners : Lille Métropole, Wallonie, Département du Pas-de-Calais, …

For more information, click here