Cooperation for sustainable innovation

Vinnova, the Swedish energy agency and the Swedish research council Formas jointly finance a total of 17 strategic innovation programmes. Cooperation in areas of strategic importance to Sweden both creates the preconditions for finding sustainable solutions to global social challenges and increases Sweden’s competitiveness in the international arena. Businesses, academia and organisations join forces under the umbrella of these programmes to develop the sustainable products and services of the future. Anyone who is able to assist with this development is welcome to apply for funding.

The strategic innovation programmes

Bioinnovation

Promotes a bio-based economy for value-added and competitiveness in the bio-based sector by 2050.

Drive Sweden

Drive Sweden encourages and supports progress towards a transportation system for people and goods that makes use of automation, digitalisation and services. The path to achieving this vision is through cross-sector cooperation.

InfraSweden2030

In this venture we finance projects that develop ideas and plans for how we in Sweden can build and maintain our transport infrastructure in a smarter and more sustainable way.

Innovair

The national programme Innovair strengthens the aviation technology area through increased collaboration, research and information dissemination.

Internet of Things

Internet of Things Sweden is a national drive for Sweden to become a leader in the use of the Internet of Things. Focus lies on solving societal challenges.

Medtech4Health

Medtech4health supports needs-based innovation in the field of medical technology.

Metallic material

The strategic innovation programme, Metallic material, gathers Sweden’s metals industries within steel, aluminium, hard metals, cast steel, cast iron and cast non-ferrous metals.

Process industrial IT and automation – PiiA

The strategic innovation programme, Process industrial IT and automation (PiiA), contributes to the development and use of automation and digitalisation within industry.

Production2030

The programme is focused on the areas that require investment to maintain competitiveness. The aim of the venture is to create a national base of research, innovation and training for competitive Swedish production 2030.

RE: Source

RE:Source focuses on developing circular, resource-efficient material flows. The goal is to achieve sustainable use of materials.

Sio grafen

Making Sweden one of the world’s top ten countries in the use of graphene to ensure the country’s industrial leadership.

SIP LIGHTer

The strategic innovation programme gathers parties to spread the industrial application of lightweight technology through research and innovation. Application opportunities are listed within the announcement.

Smart Built Environment

The Smart Built Environment programme aims to create new opportunities through digitalised urban development. The project's focus is on how digitalisation can serve as a catalyst for change in the built environment.

Smarter electronic systems

The strategic innovation programme, Smarter electronic systems, creates cross boundary work to develop micro and nano electronics, photonics, micromechanics, power electronics and integrated systems in Sweden.

Strim

Contributing to sustainable growth and strengthening the competitiveness of Swedish mining and metal extraction industries.

SWElife

The strategic innovation programme, SWElife, is a national initiative to coordinate and develop stable research and innovation processes for Swedish Life Science.

Viable Cities

The strategic innovation programme Viable Cities is a long-term initiative intended to make smart cities a key element in the transition to a sustainable society.

#Sipnytt on Twitter

The strategic research and innovation agenda initiative that ran from 2012 to 2016 laid the foundation for the current strategic innovation programmes. Under the initiative, the stakeholders active in a certain area jointly formulated a vision and objectives and defined needs and strategies to help develop a particular innovation area.

The agendas’ main aims were to address important social challenges and create growth and strengthen Sweden’s competitiveness in the area. The drafted agendas cover a broad spectrum of areas.

Systematic review reveals multiple positive effects

Sweco has conducted a systematic review of the strategic innovation agendas on behalf of the government agencies involved. This review reveals that the agendas continue to provide benefit by serving as a useful tool for increased cooperation between different stakeholders. Among other things, the results of the review reveal that:

The agendas span many areas, but focus primarily on the fields of information and communications technology and energy and climate.
Many stakeholders were involved in drafting the agendas.
The stakeholders involved have demonstrated genuine commitment to the project.
The project managers involved consider the work on the agendas to have been useful in gathering stakeholders from various organisations and fields to design a common strategy.
The agendas are still used in various ways today, even though the project has concluded. For example, they are used as a basis for applying for additional financing in their respective area.

View the agendas

Read the systematic review of the agendas (PDF file, in Swedish)