Unveiling Partners and Regions - West Region Romania

Located in the western part of Romania, the West Region is a thriving economic and cultural hub. Its capital, Timisoara, is known as "Little Vienna" for its architecture and vibrant cultural scene. The West Region encompasses several counties: Timis, Arad, Caras-Severin, and Hunedoara. It has long been recognized for its industrial and manufacturing prowess, but in recent years, it has been gaining a reputation for its dynamic business environment.

West Region Romania is a cross-border region, industrially dominated by multinationals in the automotive sector, but also with a strong manufacturing sector. The presence of several major universities facilitated the industrial specialisation and the emergence of local ICT businesses.

One of the most notable trends in the West Region is the steady growth in the number of companies. This surge in entrepreneurship is partly due to Romania's favorable business climate, but it's also a due to the region's willingness to embrace change and innovation. 

Companies in the West Region are rapidly adopting digital technologies to streamline operations, enhance customer experiences, and remain competitive in a globalized world.

Since 2004 with the first Regional Innovation Strategy, there was a direct interest for West Regional Development Agency to engage in building up the framework for innovation and help local companies to develop or adopt latest technological trends. 

Today, the EDIH initiative (DIGIVEST), is offering the opportunity to link the local ICT companies with local SMEs to steer up the adoption of digital technologies while increasing the local market and the supply ecosystem interest to deliver small scale projects.   

We are envisaging a potential market of over 18 thousand companies from manufacturing, HORECA, agri-food, energy efficiency and construction, health, and quality of life. Additionally there are 322 public administration units in West Region.

In this context, the scope of the EDIH initiative is Scaling innovation through the digital transformation of companies by providing them with tools, skills, and international networks to exploit technological trends.

We are using the opportunity of joining the Best DIH project in order to strenghten the regional framework to suport innovation, adopt good practices regarding the service delivery of DIGIVEST and improve the regional funding policies regarding digital transformation.