Broader Programmes
21 January 2022
We worked with the European Commission on nine Competitions which took place between 2013 and 2021.
The European Social Innovation Competition launched in 2013 and acts as a beacon for social innovators across Europe, employing a proven methodology for supporting early-stage ideas and facilitating a network of radical innovators shaping our society for the better. Each year the Competition addresses a different issue facing Europe.
Through its combination of financial and non-financial support during the Competition as well as the ongoing opportunities it offers to its alumni, the Competition has unearthed game-changing ideas from all across Europe and helped them to become viable, scalable and visible social enterprises.
The Competition is supported by a consortium of organisations from across Europe. From 2015 to 2021, the consortium was led by Challenge Works and included Euclid Network, GOPA Com. and Ashoka Spain.
We are honoured and proud of having delivered the Competition since its inception in 2013, and we will continue to support the European Commission in their mission to deliver impactful future editions of the Competition.
Diogo Vasconcelos was a Portuguese leader who focused on fostering innovation to address some of the great societal challenges of our time. During his career he worked closely with the European Commission and others on issues such as globalisation, sustainability, climate change, urbanisation, democratic participation and healthcare.
Diogo sadly passed away in 2011 at the age of 43. To keep his ambitions alive, the European Commission established the European Social Innovation Competition to inspire entrepreneurs across the continent to continue developing ideas that tackle the challenges our society faces.
Each year, three €50,000 prizes are awarded for the most innovative projects designed to change the world for the better.
SkillLab (Netherlands) 2021 winner
SkillLab has developed a mobile solution that helps people to identify and express their skills. On the basis of a detailed skill-profile, individual pathways are shown by mapping skills to occupations and to training offerings that address skill-gaps.
Snowball Effect (Austria) 2021 winner
Snowball Effect is the first school supporting aspiring social entrepreneurs to replicate proven social enterprises in their region. Participants learn directly from the initial founders of successful social enterprises to replicate their concept.
Zekki – What’s up? (Finland) 2021 winner
Zekki is a digital service matching young people and diverse support services based on the online wellbeing self-assessment quiz. It gives tools for young people to ponder their own well-being, future, preferences, tomorrow’s choices and own tracks. It also gives guidance and leads to appropriate support when needed.
Happening (UK) People’s Choice winner
Like Google street view, but with video; Happaning lets you navigate events from any perspective, at any time and from anywhere in one immersive live/on-demand experience. Our patented ViiVid® (multi-Vantage Video) technology synchronises multiple video feeds with a real-time P2P blockchain-style codec
MycoTEX (The Netherlands) 2021 Impact Prize winner
MycoTEX, which was a finalist in the 2020 competition – Reimagine Fashion, offers an award winning, all-in-one solution for fashion brands. They use an automated seamless production technology to create custom-fit products out of sustainable, vegan textiles made from mycelium (mushroom roots). This groundbreaking manufacturing method solves major issues in the fashion industry: It reduces cost, waste, and labour-intensity of cut and sew operations; replaces plastics and leathers with compostable materials and improves the comfort and fit of fashion products.
resortecs® (Belgium) 2020 winner
resortecs® is a start-up that has developed dissolvable stitching thread and heat-dismountable rivets, helping simplify the process of reusing and recycling textile products.
Snake (Croatia) 2020 winner
A digital commerce platform that enables users to wear limitless outfits in augmented reality, thus helping to change the way fashion is consumed.
WhyWeCraft: Cultural Sustainability in Fashion (Romania) 2020 winner
WhyWeCraft: Cultural Sustainability in Fashion is a legal support mechanism for craftspeople and designers. The project is empowering those who are maintaining traditional practices, by opening up access to otherwise complicated legal concepts.
Empower (Norway) 2020 Impact Prize winner
Empower was founded with a vision to empower people to create a cleaner and better world. It is based on the idea of using new technology to enable a circular economy. The project developed a digital plastic waste collection system through which plastic waste can be deposited and collected for a financial reward.
MIWA (Czech Republic) 2019 winner
An innovative, financially-sustainable circular distribution and sale system for food and non-food products with reusable packaging.
SpraySafe (Portugal) 2019 winner
An edible spray used on the surface of foods to preserve them, reducing the need for plastic wrapping and containers.
VEnvirotech (Spain) 2019 winner
A biotechnological start-up that transforms organic waste into biodegradable polyhydroxyalkanoate (PHA) bioplastics using bacteria.
MTOP goes digital (Austria) 2019 Impact Prize winner
MTOP goes digital, a social micro-enterprise that helps to prepare young, qualified refugees to enter the Austrian labour market using smart offline and online solutions. It also helps to maintain long term working relationships by providing post-placement support. By doing so, it also fosters international sign language education.
Career Bus (Romania) 2018 winner
Career Bus brings career orientation to young people living in rural areas by combining innovative technologies and a face-to-face interaction. Travelling to remote places, Career Bus will boost the employability and career knowledge of young residents.
Ulisse (Italy) 2018 winner
Ulisse is the first ever European digital platform that creates, markets and promotes local travel experiences and full holiday bundles designed by deaf people for deaf people.
HeritageLab (Slovenia) 2018 winner
HeritageLab teaches established innovation incubation methods to young people in small towns, supporting them in the launch of new businesses and services based on local cultural heritage that deserves appreciation.
Mouse4all (Spain) 2018 Impact Prize winner
Mouse4all has created a product to enable users to access Android tablets and smartphones with alternative input devices: switches, adapted mice, trackballs and joysticks. Mouse4all is boosting the independence and autonomy of people by increasing accessibility to their Android device.
Buildx (UK) 2017 winner
Buildx aims to democratise housing production; using digital design and distributed production to make it simple for individuals, communities and local businesses to design and build affordable housing for themselves.
Feelif (Slovenia) 2017 winner
Feelif is a multimedia tool for blind and visually impaired people which enables them to feel shapes on a standard touchscreen.
SAGA (Netherlands) 2017 winner
SAGA is a peer-to-peer learning platform that reflects and compensates the true value of knowledge and skills exchanged between educators and learners.
Bike Project (UK) 2017 Impact Prize winner
The Bike Project refurbishes second-hand bikes to donate to refugees and asylum-seekers, tackling the issue of a lack of mobility, contributing to the users’ independence and access to services. The project donated 1,000 bikes to refugees in the space of a year. A proportion of the bikes received are sold through its trading arm The Bike Shop to generate funds for the project and ensure long-term sustainability.
CUCULA (Germany) 2016 winner
CUCULA is a practical workshop and an educational program created for and together with refugees and migrants in Berlin. It designs, manufactures, produces and sells products based on the concept of Enzo Mari, providing technical qualifications with focus on furniture production. It also runs an education program that includes German language classes, legal advice and additional support.
Project Virtuous Triangle (Turkey) 2016 winner
Project Virtuous Triangle matches primary school children from Syria with young Turkish students, alongside a university age ‘coach student’ for tutoring, mentoring and language sharing. The project helps combat segregation in Turkey and means refugee children are more likely to be able to learn Turkish, attend school, and eventually get a job or open up other future opportunities.
The Machine to be Another (Spain) 2016 winner
The Machine to be Another is a cultural diversity and virtual reality experience sharing project designed to recreate, replicate, and share experiences so that people can experience life as a refugee. It uses a pre-recorded audio narrative to create a story, and shares these encounters using 360 virtual reality technology. The project aims to create stations of archived narratives from refugees all around Europe.
Love Your Waste (France) 2016 Impact Prize Winner
Love Your Waste is a social enterprise fighting food waste. It works with canteens in companies, schools, and hospitals, collecting biowaste which is transformed into renewable energy. Since April 2015 they have recycled over 137 tonnes of food waste as well as carrying out extensive education programmes to help people understand and prevent waste.
Apiform (Bosnia) 2015 winner
Apiform makes beekeeping accessible to people in wheelchairs, senior citizens, people with back pain or arthritis. By developing a beehive accessible from behind and from a lower level, Apiform allows more people to take part in the opportunities offered by beekeeping. They aim to replicate the model across countries to help restore the bee population in Europe.
The Freebird Club (Ireland) 2015 winner
The Freebird Club is a peer-to-peer social travel and homestay platform specifically designed for the over 50s. Established in Ireland, the idea applies ‘collaborative economy’ principles to address practical issues such as loneliness and financial sustainability for older people.The Freebird Club offers a new world of social travelling for older adults, with a membership-based model.
Wheeliz (France) 2015 winner
Wheeliz addresses accessibility and inclusion within the transport industry through a car-sharing platform. Public transport in many cities is not accessible, and the use of specialised taxi services is not affordable. Wheeliz aims to pool the estimated 100,000 adapted cars owned in France, to create a shared fleet of automobiles available for rent by wheelchair users.
From waste to wow! QUID project (Italy)
‘From waste to wow! QUID project’ is a fashion business demands perfection, and slightly damaged textile cannot be used for top brands. The project intends to recycle this first quality waste into limited collections and thereby provide jobs to disadvantaged women. This is about creating highly marketable products and social value through recycling.
Urban Farm Lease (Belgium)
Urban Farm Lease is an urban agriculture could provide 6,000 direct jobs in Brussels, and an additional 1,500 jobs considering indirect employment (distribution, waste management, training or events). The project aims at providing training, connection and consultancy so that unemployed people take advantage of the large surfaces available for agriculture in the city (e.g. 908 hectares of land or 394 hectares of suitable flat roofs).
Voidstarter (Ireland)
All major cities in Europe have “voids”, units of social housing which are empty because city councils have insufficient budgets to make them into viable homes. At the same time these cities also experience pressure with social housing provision and homelessness. Voidstarter will provide unemployed people with learning opportunities alongside skilled tradespersons in the refurbishing of the voids.
Community Catalysts (UK)
Community Catalysts proposes connecting talents in business and communities to create jobs for social benefit by helping people to use their creativity to set up sustainable, small-scale social care and health services that people can afford. These micro-enterprises could be offered by a wide range of people, including disabled, older and family carers. Community Catalysts want to extend their current reach and impact through a managed network of professional business and professional mentors supporting community entrepreneurs throughout the UK via an on-line platform.
Economy App (Germany)
Economy App collects information from users on what they could offer in a local economy and what their economic needs are. The software keeps a record of the value of products and services provided and accepted for every person in this economic network and so no money ever needs to change hands.
MITWIN.NET (Spain)
MITWIN.NET proposes an intergenerational professional network conceived to facilitate contact between people in order to share a job post and knowledge, with the main goal of reducing the high rate of youth unemployment. MITWIN.NET recommends that older workers share a job with younger people, allowing those approaching retirement to share knowledge with those being incorporated into the job market, easing both entry and exit from the job market and addressing young unemployment.
Looking for scalable social innovations that will contribute to job creation, growth and competitiveness in Europe.
Looking for ideas that improve the environmental and social impact of the European fashion market.
Tackling the problem of rising plastic waste levels across the world
Seeking innovative projects to empower young people to participate in a changing economy.
Seeking innovations to equip all members of society with skills and opportunities for a changing economy.
Supporting creative approaches to realise the potential of refugees and migrants in the EU.
Supported individuals and organisations with game-changing ideas for social innovation projects.
The European Social Innovation Competition 2014 ‘The Job Challenge’ sought innovative solutions for creating new types of work and address social needs.
The first edition of the Competition ‘New forms of work’ sought innovative solutions for creating new opportunities for work, and for better work.
