Establishing Living Labs

"A characteristic of laboratories is that they are a separate environment, isolated from reality and external influence. BTC City Ljubljana is entirely different. With 21 million visitors per year, characterised by a collection of related and diverse activities and content, it is very much alive and vivid," stresses Jože Mermal, President of the Management Board and CEO of BTC. An example is BTC City, which is developing a completely new concept - BTC City Living Lab. It is transforming the shopping industry and creating new value for local businesses and their customers. The rich and diverse infrastructure of BTC City Ljubljana, enables a testing space for the most advanced technologies in Smart City solutions.
BTC City Living Lab will provide the opportunity for local and global companies to test their new solutions at BTC City Ljubljana, to continue innovating, to present their solutions to customers, and to connect wihin an ecosystem of an open sociery. All those companies that are developing advanced solutions for smart cities and are interested in presenting their ideas to potential customers and cooperating with BTC in the joint promotion and development of user-friendly technological solutions will be invited to join the LivingLab.

ABC Accelerator

In 2015, BTC co-created the new development story of Slovenia: ABC - Acceleration Business City. Focused on strong, globally ambitious startups with a finished product, ABC accelerates multiple generations of startups every year. So far, ABC Accelerator has accelerated more than 80 startups and raised more than EUR 30m in invesment. ABC Accelerator is growing, establishing offices in the United States (San Jose, Silicon Valley), Germany (Munich), Ukraine (Kiev) and Tuzla. ABC Silicon Valley is the headquarters of the Acceleration Business City. With its personalised approach and program, it represents a global home for startups. Due to its exceptional network and location in WeWork, ABC Accelerator Silicon Valley offers instant contact with relevant representatives of venture capital and business angels, and to mentors who have worked with extremely successful startups such as Uber and AirBnB, and also to sponsors who have helped giants such as Tesla and Apple. In Germany, Europe's biggest and commercially most advanced market, it enables startups to be in direct contact with large technology companies that can use their solutions or, of course, invest in them. At both locations, offices and homes are provided, ABC ensures that young entrepreneurs focus only on their business.

A year ago, ABC launched another program - ABC Enterprise Accelarator. This comprehensive program was specifically formed to allow large, traditional companies to leverage entrepreneurial experience. Some acknowledged experts that have helped to change the way of leading and innovating in giants (e.g. Apple, Alibaba, Airbus, Travel Channel, US Army, DELL, Cisco) are involved, including Patrick Cowden with the Beyond approach; Herman Gyr, Lisa Friedmann and Laszlo Gyorffy, Enterprise Development Group, Palo Alto; and Andy Baynes from Nest Labs, among others.

Celebrating the startup spirit across Central Europe, CESA (Central European Startup Awards) recognise and celebrate the best entrepreneurial spirit and startup ecosystems. In November, ABC Accelerator won first place. Next year, the ambition is to be the first in Europe! In three years, ABC Accelerator has fulfilled its mission to become the "engine of innovation and change"; not only for startups but also for larger companies, both within and outside of Slovenia.