PIT STOP Project Innovation Pathways for Urban Development – is an European project that aims to promote new business incubators in the Construction and ICT sectors, and business accelerators in the manufacturing sector in Greece (Patras and Ioannina areas) and Italy (Puglia Region, Barletta and Bitonto areas). The project will make stronger the link between commercial and cultural associations, youth, labor market, public authorities and will reinforce the existing local economic networks. Pit Stop is a chance for the local entrepreneurs to strengthen the capacity to operate transnationally and internationally, by developing a circulation of new business model and promoting innovative spillover in several sectors. Thanks to the project, 4 innovative incubators will be implemented, 2 in Italy (Barletta and Bitonto) and 2 in Greece, Patras and Ioannina as educational high-tech place, with relevant equipment for 4 startup offices.
Pit Stop project is funded for € 900.952,00 by Interreg V-A Greece-Italy Programme 2014-2020 under the Priority Axis 1 – Innovation & competitiveness.
Partnership The Municipality of Barletta (Italy) is lead partner of the project in collaboration with two Italians partners, the Chamber of Commerce, Industry, Crafts and Agriculture of Bari and the Municipality of Bitonto, and two Greek partners, the Municipality of Ioannina and the Chamber of Achaia.
Project Partnership
Municipality of Barletta: Barletta is a city in south eastern Italy. It has a population of around 94.700 citizens. A renowned Art City, Barletta’s cultural heritage includes elegant architecture and precious museum collections. The heart of the historical old town is the Castle, one of Southern Italy’s most beautiful Renaissance fortresses, which now houses the Civic Museum. Even the sea can be considered one of the city’s treasures, as the city boasts an important commercial and tourist port and a coastline of fine sandy beaches. Among its food and wine products, pride of place goes to Rosso Barletta, a ruby red DOC wine.
The Chamber of Commerce of Bari (CCIAA Bari) is a territorial public body, operating in the provincial area of Bari and temporary taking charge for part of the province of Barletta-Andria-Trani. Its function is to promote the general interests of the involved business system and to enforce the development of local economies. To achieve the objective of an economical promotion of the territory, the CCIAA also created 3 Special Agencies for the implementation of specific projects, to offer business support services and specialized support to the territory: AICAI for businesses’ assistance; IFOC for education; SAMER for scientific and chemical tests.
The Municipality of Bitonto beloved to the Metropolitan City of Bari, in Apulia region Italy. The city is about 17km from Bari and it extends between the Adriatic Sea and the Murgia hill. A city of art and culture, Bitonto is nicknamed the “City of Olives”, due to the numerous olive groves surrounding the city. Indeed Bitonto is well known for its production of extra virgin olive oil, which is exported to America and elsewhere in Europ, but the city also produces wine, beer, cereals, almonds, and textiles. Recently, Bitonto has also become a popular tourist destination. With approximately 65.000 inhabitants, the city has a historical centre secured with ancient defensive works, adorned with wonderful Medieval and Renaissance building.
Chamber of Achaia (CoA) is public law entity and gathers all enterprises of regional unit of Achaia. Its basic aim is to support the development of entrepreneurship established in the area and to develop initiative towards the sustainable development of all economic segments. CoA participated in Strategic Projects of Greece–Italy 2007–2013 such as FOODING and GIFT 2.0 and has significant experience in activities implementation in the Cross Border Area. Furthermore, CoA has implemented several actions towards young innovators in the Programme area within the frames of FOODING Project and also carry out several own funded activities for innovation transfer such as the Exhibition “Patras Innovation Quest”.
Municipality of Ioannina is the capital and largest city of the Ioannina regional unit and of Epirus, an administrative region in north-western Greece, with a population of 65,574 inhabitants. It lies at an elevation of approximately 500 metres (1,640 feet) above sea level, on the western shore of lake Pamvotis. Ioannina is located 410 km northwest of Athens, 260 kilometres southwest of Thessaloniki and 80 km east of the port of Igoumenitsa in the Ionian Sea.The city’s foundation has traditionally been ascribed to the Byzantine Emperor Justinian in the 6th century AD, but modern archaeological research has uncovered evidence of Hellenistic settlements. In addition there are several religious and secular monuments survive from the Ottoman period.
Ioannina is also famous throughout Greece for its silverwork, with a plethora of shops selling silver jewelry, bronzeware and decorative items.
News & Events
Call for young enterpreneurs to select 4 innovative ideas on ICT and Smart Citizen: deadline 16 January
The Chamber of Commerce of Bari, partner of Pit Stop Project, launches a call to select 4 innovative ideas, whose business is focused on ICT, with particular reference to software or informative systems, including web and mobile, or on Smart Citizen (clean and renewable energies, innovative systems for food production or for environmental sustainability, urban regeneration, sustainable mobility, e-health). Deadline for submission is on 16 January 2020.
Proposals can be submitted exclusively by:
Informal groups composed of at least three people, aged between 18 and 35 who intend to start a new innovative company with registered and/or operational headquarters in the area of competence of the PIT-STOP project.
The projects can be a different stage of development: the training section will follow the evaluation phase.
The project must therefore be presented in its ideational form, but it contains – even if in a descriptive form – the useful elements to define the business plan. The young entrepreneurs therefore linked to be able to:
1) Fill an Application Form in which they describe shortly the business idea;
2) Submit a minimal Business Model Canvas.
It is possible to download the application form on this link http://bit.ly/2YXed56
Workshop for enterpreneurs “How to improve the relationship between banks and companies” in Barletta
The second thematic workshop “How to improve the relationship between banks and companies” was held in Barletta on 13 December with a very special speaker, Massimo Melpignano. Every breath, in a new market context, it’s a finance choise but we often forget to choose the right one. During the workshop the lawer Melpignano illustrated the dark side of the relationship between banks and companies, due to the fact that entrepreneurs does not know the financial word in a deep way. He focused on the main aspects of everyday finance, such as current account, credit lines, guarantees, central risks, credit and savings.
Workshop for enterpreneurs in Barletta on 13 December
The Chamber of Commerce of Bari, in collaboration with Unioncamere Puglia organizes a thematic workshop “How to improve the relationship between banks and companies” addressed to SMEs with the aim of developing new skills and knowledge.
The workshop will be held on 13 December 2019 in the Conference Room of the Future Center of Barletta (in Via G. Marconi n. 39). It will last about four hours from 9:00 to 13:00 CET.
The meetings are aimed at entrepreneurs, managers and company administrators, professionals, start- uppers in order to support them with useful information regarding their relationship with banks . The speaker Massimo Melpignano will describe the complex relationship between companies and banks, by focusing the attention on the world of credit lines, guarantees, central risks, credit and savings. Participation is free.
Workshop for enterpreneurs “The planet of Communication” in Barletta
The workshop for entrepreneurs and start-uppes “The planet of Communication” was held on 6 December, in the Conference Room of Future Center in Barletta.
The workshop belongs to the two thematic workshops organized by the Chamber di Commercio di Bari, partner of the project in collaboration with Unioncamere Puglia.
The workshop allows entrepreneurs to obtain new knowledge, support and the opportunity needed to put their ideas into practice and make them more efficient and able to overcome future business challenges and promote the local economy.
The first workshop focused on the role of Communication as a tool to foster market challenges. The professor Franco Liuzzi , teacher of Communication at University of Bari, showed how the great resource of communication could be able to accelerate the development of successful companies. The ongoing transformation has literally changed the media landscape. It is necessary to focus on useful and sustainable actions for competition in a complex market, to identify resources for investments and investments effectively. And to know the criteria for evaluating the investment. Companies should know if their products or services are innovative or just “unique”. What made a unique product is the capacity of communicate to its specific target, analysing the reasons for their occurrence and take steps to avoid the challenges of competition.
The next thematic workshop “How to improve the relationship between banks and companies” will be held in the same place on 13 December.
Presentation of the study for the evaluation of technological analysis
Innovation and new entrepreneurship will foster cooperation between research, the public and private sectors and will facilitate the increase in the number of start-ups with greater involvement of young start-ups and growing interaction among the new entrepreneurs to the existing ones.
In order to achieve these results, the Municipality of Barletta has commissioned the Polytechnic University of Bari a technological analysis, aimed at understanding the state of the economy and technology applied to the local company as well as identifying needs and to the technological expectations of our entrepreneurs, particularly those operating in small and medium-sized enterprises.
The project has now entered into the heart of its activities and for this reason that on 27 June 2019, the Municipality of Barletta met the representatives of the Future Center association, in which the employers and trade union associations of the BAT Province are represented.
The purpose of the meeting was to share the technological analysis conducted by the Polytechnic of Bari on the entrepreneurial fabric of BAT and to share the instrumental and technological contents of the Fab Lab to be set up at the Incubator and at the service of all existing local businesses and in incubation, one of the most important results of the PIT STOP project.
Kick-off meeting of Pit-Stop project in Barletta
The Kick-off meeting of PIT STOP project “Innovation Pathways for Urban development”, funded for € 900.952,00 by the Interreg V-A Greece-Italy Programme 2014-2020, was held on 24th and 25th October in Barletta (Theater “G. Curci” conference room).
The Municipality of Barletta is lead partner of the project in collaboration with two Italian partners, the Chamber of Commerce, Industry, Crafts and Agriculture of Bari and the Municipality of Bitonto, and two Greek partners, the Municipality of Ioannina and the Chamber of Achaia. The PIT STOP project, financed under Priority Axis 1 – Innovation and Competitiveness, aims to promote new business incubators in the construction and ICT sectors, and business accelerators in the manufacturing sector, by making stronger the link between commercial and cultural associations, youth, labor market, public authorities and by reinforcing the existing local economic networks.
Thanks to the project, 4 innovative incubators will be implemented, 2 in Italy (Barletta and Bitonto) and 2 in Greece, Patras and Ioannina as educational high-tech place, with relevant equipment for 4 startup offices. Innovation and new entrepreneurship will foster the creation of businesses by involving young people with new economic opportunities and by connecting new entrepreneurs to existing ones, providing them infrastructure, networks, resources and information.
Contact Us
Municipality of Barletta
Tel: +390883578481 | +390883578480
ufficioeuropa@comune.barletta.bt.it