Swedish Mass Innovation Camp: Increased order books by 25 percent, 75% increased company value

Increased order books by 25 percent

Industrial companies in the Swedish Nässjö, Sävsjö, Vaggeryd and Jönköping have developed with a value equivalent to millions of Swedish crowns. During a transfo0rmation program, the entrepreneurs involved in the initiative witnessed the tangible outcomes and hope there will be a continuation for the project.

Growkomp has been assigned the task of during three years, contributing to the increased growth and competitiveness of 22 companies in the manufacturing industry. The European Social Fund has financed this development project with 8.2 million Swedish crowns. The business units in Nässjö, Sävsjö, Vaggeryd and Jönköping have driven the initiative in close collaboration with Jönköping University and Science Park Jönköping, as well as key actors and suppliers, Codeq and Innovation 360 Group.

The project ended on Thursday the 17^thof May 2018, with a media conference at Hooks Herrgård. Around 70 entrepreneurs took the opportunity to take part in the initiative and listened to interesting and inspiring lectures with e.g. Network’s founder Lee Saville; International Innovation Expert and Author Magnus Penker and; Östersund Football Club Culture Coach Karin Wahlén.

“Increased order books by 25 percent"

Magnus Penker, CEO of Innovation 360 Group, shared his knowledge of how to become an attractive and successful employer, as well as presented statistics on how the participant companies have developed since the Growkomp project started.

"On average, order books have increased by 25 percent and revenue by 12 percent. During the same period Sweden as a country increased its GDP by 5 percent. So that's a clear improvement when comparing to the rest of the country, he said.

In addition, it appears that the value of the companies has increased 75 times, based on development, a measure that is of course interesting for future potential external capital expansion.

Testimonials of the participants

During the conference, several companies got the opportunity to tell how Growkomp developed their operations.

-During Growkomp, we implemented CSR work in our strategy plan. We have now been granted permission by the Management Group to invest in a new heat pump that will reduce our energy consumption by half. Additionally, we are entitled to invest 500,000 crowns every year for the ten coming years in our strategy to become climate neutral, which means that we will produce our own electricity based on solar energy. We have also set up charging stations that all employees can use for free to contribute to climate-smart transportation to and from work. By Ragnar's CEO Johan Ragnar, whose sustainability work has created new business for the company.

-"Thanks to Growkomp, we've put our business plan on paper and designed a strategy for our future growth". By Patrik Sjölin, CEO of Addbrand Sweden (formerly called Kuvertteamet).

-"After we started with Growkomp, we have developed four new products. Previously it would had taken us ten years to do it. Now it took about six months per product”. By Bengt Staude, CEO of Orwak.

Want to start a new project

The conference ended with an information meeting on the possible continuation of Growkomp. There is the ambition to start a Growkomp 2.0, which will give another 20 companies the opportunity to develop their business and business plans.

-"We will have the same main areas as the last time: Strategic skills supply, business development/ innovation capability and CSR/Equality. The main difference from the first project is that, we will invest less time in education and training and more on personal coaching and bootcamps, facilitating the companies to have time to work together internally. This time we will also invite companies from other industries, said Carl-Gunnar Karlsson, project manager at Vaggeryds Näringslivsråd.

The expectation is that Growkomp 2.0 starts on September the 12th.