Foreign interest in local Incubator

Mary Spaeth (middle) visited The Innovation Hub's new site with CEO Dr Neville Comins and Incubation Manager Jill Sawers, seen here with her in front of the partly constructed Innovation Centre.

Market strategist Mary Spaeth, General Manager of the East Sweden Development Agency (ESDA) in Sweden, recently visited The Innovation Hub to meet the team and explore the synergies between start-up companies in Swedish Incubators and those in the Business Incubator at The Innovation Hub. Her visit coincided with her attendance as a presenter at the ICSB (International Council for Small Business) World Conference held in Johannesburg in June this year.

Spaeth is a seasoned business professional, responsible for foreign direct investment to the Östergötland region in Sweden, with 13 municipalities and a population of 500 000. She has spent the last twenty years working on market strategies for companies and regions in the US, UK, Canada, and Sweden.

While in South Africa, she also met with representatives of GEDA (Gauteng Economic Development Agency), looking at inward/outward investment opportunities as her experience includes supporting new business growth and economic development in the high technology industry and conducting market analyses for technology companies seeking entry into the United States.

Spaeth has consulted on incubator development in the St. Petersburg and Moscow regions, and worked on numerous Incubator and Science Park developments in the US, UK, Russia and Sweden. In 1997 the Technology Innovation Center at one of these Parks, the Northwestern University/Evanston Research Park in Evanston, Illinois, won the coveted National Business Incubation Association's Randall Whaley award for Incubator of the Year.

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