FANS

International project will help expats start their businesses!

Ostrava Expat Centre is expanding its services! From March 2023 till March 2025, we are coordinators of the international project Erasmus+ which aims to develop a new service for expats.

The FANS project team – From Adaptation to New Skills and Self-Employment empowers expats in the Czech Republic, Poland and Portugal to develop their careers and integrate into the local economy through essential country-specific knowledge and entrepreneurial skills.

From 13 to 16 June, we hosted our international partners from Startup Leiria (Portugal) and Poznan Science and Technology Park (Poland) in Ostrava. The programme was full of sharing good practice and experiences.

First day of the visit was dedicated to the Moravian-Silesian Innovation Centre – we presented our entrepreneurial programmes for small and medium-sized companies and showed how the MSIC deals with environmental and digital challenges by involving companies. Then we spent some time in the IdeaHUB (prototype incubator) and Smart Factory and Smart Home (at VŠB-TUO). At the end of the day, we showed our partners what Poruba district looks like with its style of social realism.

On Wednesday, we spent a few hours at the Ostrava Expat Centre office, where we presented the whole scope of our activities (from one-stop-shop to events and programmes for companies). The next stop was at the Impact Hub where they introduced the consortium to their Craft incubator, their programmes for starting a business and also gave a quick tour of their premises.

Thursday – the day of exploring the Dolní Vítkovice industrial area. In the morning, we visited the craft incubator Fajna Dílna – a place where everyone can come and develop a craft business. The guided tour of the industrial area was also appreciated by foreign partners. It was followed by a visit to our Expats&Locals exhibition in the Futureum. We also had a FANS project meeting there – we discussed upcoming events, activities and also specific service that we want to develop (hope you are looking forward to it!) At the end of the day, we met at the Rapzzz for the English Coffee Ostrava event.

The last day of the visit was devoted to the StartFactory event – one of the MSIC services for „wannebe-entrepreneurs“ – people who want to start a business or are at the stage of thinking about it. This event takes place every Friday at the Ostrava Expat Centre office or at the Impact Hub. This time, Jan Slavíček had a workshop on the topic „Talents are universal“. We crowned our international visit at the HogoFogo restaurant.

We were happy to welcome our international partners to Ostrava and we look forward to our next steps and meetings!

This project is co-financed by the European Union, Erasmus+ grant.