Online survey of needs and challenges of innovation ecosystems and intermediaries for taking up activity in the EU space sector

The present dataset was generated as part of the "Needs and challenges of innovation ecosystems and intermediaries for taking up activity in the EU space sector" of the H2020 InnORBIT project that aims to empower innovation intermediaries (clusters, digital innovation hubs, SME associations, industry associations etc.) in Central-Eastern and South-Eastern Europe to establish space support initiatives and provide business support to space innovators (start-ups, scale-ups, SMEs, etc.) to scale their commercial activity in the space and space-related sectors.

The aim of this study was to identify and explore the available and missing skills of innovation intermediaries to provide business support services to innovators within their local ecosystems to develop commercial activity in space. The assessment of skills was based on a baseline framework encompassing a wide array of skills and competencies innovation intermediaries are supposed to possess in order to provide effective business support services to space innovators. The skills of the baseline framework are grouped into five broad categories: (i) space industry knowledge, (ii) business assessment knowledge, (iii) business support skills, (iv) organisational and digital skills and (v) soft skills. The baseline framework was originally developed by the InnORBIT consortium through research in related works of EU funded projects and publications and validated through a series of 15 interviews with top-level executives of organisations across the CEE and SEE area, belonging to the two target groups of the study (i.e., innovation intermediaries and innovators). An online survey was deployed from May 26th to June 18th using the EU Survey tool, to innovation intermediaries and innovators across the EU and CEE/SEE countries in particular. Two online questionnaires were developed building on the baseline skills framework - the first intended for innovation intermediaries asking them to perform a self-assessment of their skills in terms of providing business support services and the second targeting innovators, asking them to state their perception on how innovation intermediaries they have worked with, perform in each of the skills.

The dataset contains two files:

1. a pdf file of the digital questionnaires developed in EU Survey deployed to innovation intermediaries and innovators in the region

2. An excel file with 104 valid responses collected from the online survey (56 innovation intermediaries and 48 innovators) across 16 EU countries / 21 countries total. The dataset contains only non-sensitive anonymised information and is in full compliance with the GDPR provisions. Demographic data were collected about the organisations of respondents such as country, organisation type, level/years of experience, sector(s) of activity, organisation types of collaborators (from the opposite target group) and level of experience of collaborators among other information, to enable the extraction of meaningful results. The core variables of the dataset are linked to the survey questions.