Recent testimonies of successful business networking - Erasmus for Young Entrepreneurs programme
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Giancarlo Ostuni (Italy)
Age: 26
Company name: (Start-up)
Sector of activity: Energy, fuel, electricity and other sources of energy
"My experience at EV-Box allowed me to live in the future for some months: I could test my business idea in a more mature market, seeing how things could become in my country and being able to map needs and challenges of my future customers. Erasmus for Young Entrepreneurs is Europe at its best.”
Kristof Vereenooghe (Netherlands)
Age: 46
Company name: EV-Box (10 years of experience)
Sector of activity: Energy, fuel, electricity and other sources of energy
Period of exchange: 02/2017 until 04/2017
Duration of exchange: 2 months
EV-Box is an Amsterdam-based leading company dealing with charging infrastructure for Electric Vehicles. Over the years, the company had been growing exponentially in the Dutch market. Yet, CEO Kristof Vereenooghe, wanted to internationalise EVs to reach new markets.
Further in the south of Italy, Giancarlo Ostuni had a business idea, he wanted to bring electric mobility in his region leveraging on the growing money streams coming from tourism. He heard that Erasmus for Young Entrepreneurs could help him develop his business plan.
Erasmus for Young Entrepreneurs created the opportunity to collaborate with Kristof Vereenooghe. Leveraging on each-other strengths, both entrepreneurs found ways to mutually benefit from each other assets. Kristof had the opportunity for an early market research on electric mobility in Italy whereas Giancarlo could refine his business idea in a fast-growing company and, in a more mature market than this region.
The first month, Giancarlo helped with Kristof and his marketing team, went through an intense week of trainings: from general market understanding to technical training to marketing-specific education.
After only two weeks, Giancarlo was already well aware of the market and the reasons behind the fast development of EVs in Netherlands that he studied and compared to the Italian market. Customer interviews and a constant involvement in the fast-growing EV-Box environment allowed him to quickly increase his awareness.
Hence back in Italy, using the knowledge acquired, he started helping EV-Box to develop their marketing strategy to the market. As the only Italian speaker, he notably supported them to connect with the Italian customers; in this sense, he was translating and adapting their communication to this target.
He also undertook and extensive research on the future possible scenarios of the development of Electric Mobility in Southern Europe. With the results, he could refine his business plan to adapt it to the realities of the of the market in that region.
Thanks to Kristof, he get in touch with investors and entrepreneurs, that are key players in the industry and who also have strong ties with the Mediterranean market.
Thanks to this two-month exchange, Giancarlo acquired knowledge which reinforced his self-confidence which allowed him to apply form a Youth Entrepreneurship Grant in Puglia "PIN regional call".
In August 2017, his business "Sagelio", which offers electric car rental and charging stations rental, saw the light and in November, they got the funding.
For more information, please contact the local contact points involved in the exchange:
New entrepreneur's contact point:
UNISCO Network per lo Sviluppo Locale (Bari, Italy)
Host entrepreneur's contact point:
Erasmus Centre for Entrepreneurship (Rotterdam, Netherlands)
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