After joining the EBN family in April 2016 as candidate EU|BIC, Budapest Enterprise Agency went through the EU|BIC certification process successfully, becoming the only accredited EU|BIC in the country.
Budapest Enterprise Agency (BEA) was established by the Municipality of Budapest in 1993 for the development and promotion of the micro, small and medium enterprises of the Hungarian capital. The mission of BEA is to provide assistance to startups and developing SMEs, to help them to achieve better performance through its management, training and consulting services, and to support and manage research and training projects analysing and improving the conditions of enterprises, and furthermore, to assist the internationalisation process of SMEs, especially beyond the EU market.
The two pillars of the activity of the Agency are innovative SME development and non-profit microfinancing. BEA is one of the few European SME development organisations that provide both low-amount (below 32,000 EUR) financial services for micro entrepreneurs and non-financial, business development services to SMEs. Women and young entrepreneurs are emphasised target groups of the services of the BEA.
Why Has BEA decided to become a certified EU|BIC?
BEA’s main reason for joining the “certified EU|BIC club” is to expand its international activities specifically EU related ones by organising matchmaking events for SMEs, connecting the Hungarian SMEs with international partners for business, technology transfer, as well as the access to EU funding. To encourage collaboration and network with the fellow EBN members, BEA offers its knowledge, expertise and meeting rooms in Budapest for international project meetings and big events, also share its extended business network with the Visegrad 4 countries and business development agencies of twin cities of Budapest.
After joining last year as an associate/candidate EU|BIC member and gaining deep insight into the services EBN provides, BEA wanted to benchmark themselves with the other EU|BICs in the network and gain additional credibility within the local ecosystem, attracting startups and SMEs in the region.
The EU|BIC certification process is not an easy process to go through, since a candidate EU|BIC needs to go through a range of quality assessments before receiving EU|BIC trademark, representing EU|BIC Quality Mark Criteria, the only quality system recognised by the European Union.
However, since EU|BIC’s compliance to the certification is revised on a yearly basis by filling the quality questionnaire and undergoing audits if selected within the evaluation programme, the EU|BICs are encouraged to constantly seek improvement, having the ability to benchmark with the fellow EU|BICs and see how they can provide an added value to the business development in their region.
Along with other members, BEA will have the opportunity to attend EBN events gathering professionals in the entrepreneurial ecosystem (e.g upcoming Congress and Techcamp), get access to relevant opportunities for EC funded grants and tenders, network, and collaborate with other members, with a possibility to penetrate foreign markets in a smoother way – using the local expertise of EU|BICs in the region.
We congratulate BEA for becoming certified EU|BIC in Hungary!