Creative Wallonia

I joined the Agency for Technological Stimulation (AST = Agence de Stimulation Technologique) to contribute to setting-up a real prospective monitoring tool: the Trends Observatory. At the ODT (= Observatoire des Tendance = Trends Observatory) I'll be in charge of defining, in consultation with the partners on the field (companies and research centers), the carrier topics that our efforts should be focused on, but also to transmit information about these topics, gathered from the AWEX and WBI networks, to the Walloon economical actors.

I am an expert at AWT where I am in charge of the coordination and international relations for the co-working areas labeled CREATIVE WALLONIA brought together at CoWallonia, the Walloon network of co-working areas. Within the framework of CREATIVE WALLONIA, I also have a mission to monitor, advise and promote co-working and innovative operating procedures (NWOW, New World of Work) to the economical actors and Walloon citizens.

The CREATIVE WALLONIA "Digital School" project allowed us to equip the school with 30 Touch iPods and with one iPad. The use of these new technologies had a definite impact on the educational methods. We are now encouraging even more the autonomy and discovery aspect by favoring collaboration between pairs of students and a better communication between students and teacher. By using ICT, we can also better follow up the rhythm of each student and allow them to evolve based on their actual needs.

From firefighter to cross-media scriptwriter, evolving into a lawyer and an international journalist, this has allowed me to travel the four corners of the cultural world; multi-disciplinary is basically the philosophy of life that I have used to combine industry and entertainment for more than 15 years. The web and I, we were once young together and the Creative Wallonia investment in CrossMedia allows us, KWEB and me, to relive the excitement of the first digital emotions.

When obtaining Boost-Up CCI financing, the "lePetitLitteraire.fr" collection was still in an embryonic prototype stage, when compared to the current situation. Thanks to the support of CREATIVE WALLONIA, Primento was able to develop much faster than initially estimated. Numerous trade agreements have been drafted, and success is now near! During the months after Boost-up, partnership agreements were also signed with the principal actors of the digital book, both in Europe as well as in the United States: Amazon.fr, Fnac, Apple, Google, etc... For this reason we can serenely head for the development of future collections.

Our project puts talented students in the field of multimedia and potential customers in need of their services, in contact with each other. Our team is now also participating in the NEST'up program by CREATIVE WALLONIA through which YoungSkills will be able to prove all of its potential.

The 'Glacis Textile' fabric is an innovative handloom fabric, made for fashion and high-end design purposes. Using the Boost Up financing, we bought equipment in view of mechanical production to manufacture large-size samples of fabric panels, ready to sell. This was an ideal solution to launch the international start-up, to participate in fairs and to make the product known to the general public.

In partnership with the CEI of Louvain-la-Neuve, the Louvain Technology Transfer Office (LTTO) opened a hosting area for UCL researchers and students in order to help them realize their startup project. The call for projects launched by CREATIVE WALLONIA was an acceleration boost to our project! It allowed us to realize this project through financing support, but it also allowed us to open it up to a greater public and to offer an area for exchanging, sharing and collaborating. We count on the dynamism of our own animation in the co-working areas to allow these different profiles to meet each other and to create a real innovation community at Louvain-la-Neuve.

Im recently graduated from the University of Lige (HEC Faculty). With an entrepreneur's spirit, Im an actor of innovation in Wallonia. Indeed, Ive co-organized the first Wake Up Call Belgium in februari 2012, I was the pioneer of TEDx events in Wallonia (TEDxULg) and I founded an organization called Student&Go (currently in development). Finally, being selected to represent Belgium at the international One Young World summit in october 2012 in Pittsburgh (USA), Creative Wallonia allows me to confirm my presence by assuming the remaining sponsorship amount.

With Intersango we wish to establish a platform for encouraging exchanges between people and making these exchanges user-friendly, accessible, but above all simple. Our project will be realized thanks to NEST'up, as we are one of the 6 finalists selected to be part of the Start-up accelerator!

Ben Piquard manages the Microsoft Innovation Center of Mons (Belgium) and is an Evangelist at Microsoft. On top of that, as a mentor or member of the jury, Ben regularly attends projects such as start-up Week-ends, in Wallonia, in Brussels or elsewhere, since the MIC is an active member of the MIC ww network, present in more than 40 countries. Ben Piquard is also one of the co-founders of the non-profit organization "Fostering Ideas", which is at the origin of the "NEST'up project".

Linadura is an editor operational within a philosophy of simple design, linear and sustainable. Production is local (Wallonia), but Linadura satisfies the global demand! Thanks to the Boost‑Up financing, we were able to acquire equipment to launch the Recto Verso collection, a contemporary furniture generated form a combined technique of punching and manual bending, to production. Today we are ready to participate in sector events such as the "INTERIEUR" Fair in Kortrijk, in order to initiate new distributor partnerships and find various commercial agents to export the product range.

The experience obtained at the Id Campus platform was a turning point in my educational career. Thanks to a 5 months training period, I had the opportunity to work on a shared project in collaboration with students from various faculties. This multidisciplinary team project anchored on creativity allowed me to exchange my competences with those of my colleagues. Besides the enriching aspect, this first insertion in a professional environment allowed me to build up an acquaintance network of both professionals and friends at the same time.

I am the Strategic Intelligence manager at the Agency for Economic Stimulation (ASE= Agence de Stimulation conomique). In fact, Strategic Intelligence allows creativity and innovation to increase, this is the common target of the CREATIVE WALLONIA program. The Third Edition of the Strategic Intelligence Conference organized by ASE will, of course, be part of the Creativity Week 2012program!

The call for "co-working" projects by CREATIVE WALLONIA seemed like a unique opportunity for us to realize a local project that, in order to boost creativity and innovation in our region, gathers the energies of numerous partners coming from various environments. It allowed us to set up the SWITCH co-working area, managed by a brand new cooperative company. SWITCH should become an undeniable place in Charleroi, open to everyone looking for a professional entrepreneur framework for working, learning, meeting, exchanging, creating, innovating... and having fun.

15 months ago, when the idea of co-working emerged in our spirits, we and our colleagues were not aware of the existence of CREATIVE WALLONIA. Luckily, whilst "googling", we discovered the "Co-working Area" call for projects. This allowed us to generate a large number of meetings within the world of entrepreneurship, innovation and creativity in Lige, but also all over Wallonia. As a matter of fact, CREATIVE WALLONIA opened numerous doors for us to bring the La Forge project to a starting point which we hope to be very positive!

The call for "co-working" projects by Creative Wallonia seemed like a unique opportunity for us to realize a local project that gathers the energies of numerous partners coming from various environments. It allowed us to set up the SWITCH co-working area, managed by a brand new cooperative company. SWITCH should become an undeniable place in Charleroi, open to everyone looking for a professional entrepreneur framework for working, learning, meeting, exchanging, creating, innovating... and having fun.

During my training and my thesis at the ID-Campus, I had the opportunity to meet many different people working on various projects, some of these with a broad impact range. Some of them came from the communication university, others from urbanism, from HEC or even from a master in social engineering. All of these competences made it possible to either work together on a complex project or separately each person had responsibilities in their specific domains.