Welcome back to the CivTech Alliance Global Scale-up Programme! We are building on the success of the Programme from last year, and we are looking forward to helping scale-up companies accelerate their product roll-out of net zero and climate change solutions for public sectors across the world.

This is our second year of this hugely exciting and highly innovative programme, which draws together leading GovTech and CivTech innovation programmes from around the world, to deliver a global platform for fast growth companies to access policymakers, procurers and investors across regional ecosystems through our Scale-Up Safari. And from there, to present at a series of demo day events.

Last year we selected 18 companies from nine countries. During a seven-week ‘Scale-up Safari’ preceding COP26 we scheduled 69 engagement sessions with policymakers and procurers, investors and innovators across our 10 participating Alliance member countries. Over 200 introductions were made, including the NASA open innovation team, the Federal Emergency Management Agency of the US Government, top researchers in the field of sustainability, ministers of environment and international trade, and gatekeepers of the €500m German family office funds. So, thank you for taking an interest.

For stakeholders across governments, NGOs, the climate change community, investors and sponsors, this is a unique opportunity to engage and collaborate with scale-ups across North America, South America, Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Australia to deliver real impact on climate change.

This global access has been of huge value not just to the innovators but also to our policymakers. Governments wouldn’t normally have a reason to engage with such a diverse spectrum of stakeholders. Our innovative approach was of sufficient interest that viewers from 46 countries tuned in to watch the ministerial-attended presentations by our companies and guest speakers during COP26.

This collaboration between governments, academic institutions, NGOs and pioneering tech businesses is the embodiment of the COP27 Goal of Collaboration. The Global Scale-up Programme seeks to bridge the divide between environmental policy and tangible impact on the ground through technologies that help address both the effects and the causes of this climate crisis. And that’s why we were delighted to win Apolitical’s Global Public Service Team of the Year for Climate, and we’ve been selected as one of three teams to present live on stage at the Creative Bureaucracy festival in Berlin in June. So it’s all go for GSUP 2!

So what is new for 2022? Based on the success of last year’s programme, we will be adopting many of the processes and approaches that worked so well. However, elements of the programme are still innovative and experimental as it is working not just across borders but jurisdictions, and this is what makes the programme so exciting. We want to demonstrate how to bridge that gap between policy and delivery to achieve outcomes. And thus we are delighted to be working with the United Nations Development Programme and the World Bank who have helped shape our challenges for this year.

(Aron) So, who is the Global Scale-up Programme ideally aimed at? The GSUP is aimed at fast growth scale ups. We focus on scale ups for three reasons:

Firstly, impact. In order to maximise impact, our belief is that companies with slightly more mature products which are able to be rolled out faster given the right access are more likely to achieve outcomes quicker.

Second, how do you accelerate that impact? Well this is about enabling access to governments, the public sector and procuring agencies and innovation ecosystems in multiple locations as quickly as possible - and that is our Scale-up Safari. For companies who join us and collaborate with us, it is an opportunity to be in front of some of the leading innovation teams from governments around the world. This is about access to ecosystems companies wouldn’t otherwise have access to.

Thirdly - if you are going to be introduced to ten or so governments in rapid succession, you should ideally have the capacity and capability for the follow up afterwards. GSUP 1 made over 200 introductions across 102 organisations.

We understand that companies at this stage of growth need business development opportunities, not workshops. In that sense, this is not an accelerator programme but an access programme - access to communities both private and public that you wouldn’t necessarily normally be able to access, along with introductions to investors and global entrepreneurs.

That’s not to say we will rule out teams with great ideas, but applicants should be aware of who this is oriented towards and the commitment involved to get the most out of this programme. But don’t take our word for it - feel free to watch any of the alumni videos where they give their perspectives and how it benefited their company. 

Who are the programme teams? Check out the videos on the Meet the Teams page and you can find out more about the teams involved. These aren’t faceless programmes. You will meet many of the Alliance members who appear in the videos, and in that sense it’s giving a face to Government. Over the past two years - and especially through GSUP 1 - we have leaned on each other for support. Afterall, changing the way government works is not an easy task.

With this consistent engagement, we have built trust, friendships and opportunities. The point is, by engaging with us, you are engaging with a community who know each other well and will help you navigate the various governments.

So how does the global scale up program work? Here we outline the different stages and what to expect from each stage. But before we get into the stages, we want to highlight a few elements.

The first few stages of the programme, up to the end of the Scale-up Safari, will be run virtually. Thereafter, we look forward to meeting up in person for the Demo Week. The programme will be run in English and in order to cater for the different time zones, most of the sessions will be run in the afternoon Central European time.

Unlike many of our country-specific programmes, The Global Scale-up Programme does not include contractual payments. This is not a procurement process. All our programmes - whilst similar in many respects - operate under different legal frameworks and different contractual arrangements. So in order to achieve parity across the regions, we took the decision to remove any form of payment. Interestingly, feedback from the companies last year indicated that access and exposure was of more value than payment for participation.

We also want to use this as an opportunity to follow people's journeys throughout this process. So we would like to encourage the use of video diaries which we will then compile, edit together and socialise. As well as helping with the marketing and promotion of the companies participating, we also want to understand what people’s experiences are as they go through this innovative programme.

(Guilherme) Due to the breadth and depth of the programs the first few stages of the Scale-up programme take place at a regional level. So you’ll see we’ve split our membership into their respective regions: North America, South America, Europe, Middle East, Africa and Australia.

We’ve done this for three reasons 

Firstly - ecosystem engagement - each of our programmes are plugged into innovation and investment networks, so it made sense to tap into those regional networks to both promote the Programme and source companies to participate.

Secondly - effort - All of our programmes are currently running their business-as-usual programmes and this Global Scale-up Programme is on top of the already stretching workloads. As such we wanted to spread some of the effort between the different teams.

Thirdly, it makes it easier for companies to engage on an ongoing basis with regional teams. Of course, we welcome applications from companies outside the programme team countries.

Stage 1 - Market Engagement

The first stage is pre-launch market engagement. These activities have been running for the past few months. This is about getting buy-in for the concept both internally and externally. So our individual Alliance members have been speaking to policymakers, potential participant companies and investors gathering feedback on the proposition. Like last year, we’ve taken feedback on board and adapted aspects of the programme and how it works.

Stage 2 - Challenge open Call

The second stage is the Open Call which is your opportunity to respond to the challenges. GSUP 2.0 will focus on two challenge areas based on consultation and advice from country policy experts, and from our two strategic partners, the World Bank and the UNDP. There is an overarching theme of how we can only rise to the challenges of the climate crisis by working together.

The challenges we will be inviting proposals on are: How can governments better build ‘nature-smart’ decision-making in the Environmental Adaptation and Economic Development area , as it seeks to support their policymakers who face complex trade offs involving the management of ‘natural capital’?

How can we tackle barriers to Green Public Procurement (GPP) around the perception in governments that green products and services are more expensive?

Hopefully the videos and information on the website will give you a flavour of the programme and the eligibility criteria and scorecard. Our application form is a simple word document and you can submit/resubmit at any time during the open call. If you have any questions, then this is your opportunity to ask, so feel free to join the drop-in engagement sessions that will be held throughout May.

You can read about the challenges [here]:

The third stage is the sifting and evaluation stage. This is split into two parts. 

The regional teams will be assessing the applications with a view to shortlisting up to 10 companies per region to take forward for interview. 

At the interview, we will be interested in finding out more about you, your team, your company, your ambitions, investment journey, as well as your solution to the challenge - and of course it is your opportunity to ask any questions about the programme. From the interviews, we then select up to 5 per region to go through to the Global Scale-up Safari. 

Once selected, there will be two further items we need for you. The first is a ‘needs analysis’ document which will be used by the host country teams to inform engagement sessions with policymakers and procurement agencies. The second is a 4-5 minute video on your solution and team. We will share both these items with the policy teams so they get a feel for who is in the room in advance of meeting you. 

The fourth stage is the Scale-up Safari. So what should you expect from it? This is where all that regional activity comes together at a global level. Here you will join a global cohort comprising up to 20 companies from the other regions. Remember, this is not an accelerator programme - you will not be receiving workshops on product, business and personal development that you might receive within an accelerator - we would expect you to be well past those requirements. We understand that for your stage of business, this is about business development, and key to that is access. 

As part of a global cohort you will be rotated virtually through all the Alliance members over a seven week period. Effectively, each Alliance team will host the cohort for a period of a few days where you will meet the appropriate policy makers within each country, and make introductions into the local innovation and investment ecosystems. To cater for the different time zones, most of the sessions will take place in the afternoon Central European Time.

We recognise that the scale up Safari will be quite a time commitment. However the value from this is to gain access to policymakers and procurers, investors and the regional innovation ecosystems - access to people you wouldn’t necessarily otherwise have access to. Last year we estimated that around 60 introductions would be made. The real figure was over 200 in over 100 organisations.

Take a look at some of the videos from the previous cohort who give their take on how to get the most out of the Safari.

And so to stage five - events at COP27. COP stands for “Conference of the Parties”. These climate change COPs organised through the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, have taken place nearly every year since 1992. COP26 was in Glasgow. COP27 is in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt from 7th to 18th November.

Our plan is to host a series of showcase events where there will be opportunities to present to governments and cleantech investors on the solutions to the challenges. But as we progress through the program the details of that will become clearer. We would anticipate that in order to gain maximum value from the event we would organise events over three days and these would be in person. But this is an opportunity to present on a global stage at a global platform.

It is important to see COP27 as a snapshot, not the final destination. As with many of our programmes, the demo day is really the start of the collaborations between our companies and our public sector challenge sponsors. We recognise the importance of a phase that enables further collaboration.

Stage 6 - Field testing

And that’s why we introduced stage six - the field testing phase - a six-month period to build on some of the connections and opportunities accrued from the previous six months. But to be clear, this is not a guarantee of any contract but rather keeping the door open. Of course if procurements and accelerated funding do arise from this, then that’s great and that is the aim of the programme, but they would be run directly with the Alliance member. 

So there you have it - this is how the CivTech Alliance COP27 Global Scale-up Programme will work. Join us on this journey to help each other help the planet.