Swedes and Norwegians with ideas that contribute to a sustainable world can get a shortcut to the market through Bioexpress. A program that connects forest-based innovations with entrepreneurs who can turn them into blockbusters.

Paper Province has a method known as Bioexpress, which connects climate-smart ideas with resourceful entrepreneurs. As a world-leading cluster in the forest based bioeconomy, and one of the actors in the Swedish-Norwegian collaboration The Bioeconomy Region, Paper Province sits on knowledge and contacts that innovators may need to reach out with their business concepts.

Urgent challenges require quick methods

Society is struggling with challenges that require new products and services. Solutions that are based on renewable resources and help to achieve the environmental goals, locally and globally.

– There is no time to lose when it comes to climate change. Therefore, our innovation systems need to be quick and agile, so that great ideas do not get buried in office drawers. They need to get out on the market where they can make a change, says Gunnar Hellerström.

Gunnar works as project manager and innovation advisor at Paper Province and is also a member in The Bioeconomy Region project.

– Bioexpress is designed for quick results. The step from idea to business should not feel hard or complicated. And the innovators and entrepreneurs who participate get a safe and effective way into the market that is right for them.

The process is built on a proven framework and is speeded up because the advisors and the contact network are in place already from the start, both on the Swedish and Norwegian side of the border.

Get to know each other

A Bioexpress usually takes around three months. The time is used to test the attractiveness of the innovation and find a collaboration form that suits all parties. The prospect is started, staffed, verified, gets relevant contacts and investigates continued funding. If all goes well, it may be a good idea to start a company, but in that case, this happens after the Bioexpress period.

Example of success

Drinor is a company that has been created thanks to Bioexpress. The innovation, a Continuous Dewatering Press (CDP) is a unique, energy saving solution that presses water out of biomass. It was delivered to a customer for the first time in 2017.

– We got the opportunity to test the business idea and innovation on the market and found a great interest. When the Bioexpress phase was completed, we had a business plan, financing strategy and letter of intent with the first customer. It had not been possible without Bioexpress and the process gave life to a new company with an international market, based in Karlstad, says Carl Romlin and Alexander Thelander who worked in the Bioexpress project, now employed at Drinor.

Carl Romlin and Alexander Thelander are employess of the company Drinor, which came to be with the help of the Bioexpress program.