Warsaw

Cambridge Innovation Center (CIC) opens its second European location in Warsaw, Poland

The new CIC Warsaw branch will operate as an innovation campus, focusing on attracting technological talent from 17 CEE countries and will open in Summer 2020. CIC Warsaw will also be one of the main centers nurturing the development of breakthrough technologies in the region.

Ideas, knowledge, and resources are some of the most important factors for any successful entrepreneur. CIC has developed a unique and proven model of operations over the last two decades, which will enable Polish and regional leaders to expand in international markets.

The CIC campus will be located in Warsaw's Varso Place, a building complex which includes the tallest office building in the EU, and it will be the second CIC location in Europe after Rotterdam. It will occupy 14,000 sq m (over 150K sq ft). A part of this area will be devoted to technological hubs with companies operating in today's most important areas of innovation: sustainability, digital transformation of real estate, Internet of Things, security and aerospace. Apart from the hubs, CIC Warsaw will also house a 3D prototyping area, a co-working space for international companies, an exclusive business club and an area for social innovation accessible to all (District Hall).

Cambridge Innovation Center was established in Cambridge, Massachusetts (MA) and quickly became the main center of innovation in the United States with an extensive community including investors. So far, over USD 8 billion has been invested in companies that began their businesses within CIC spaces. The presence of CIC in Cambridge and Boston has had a significant impact on the development of innovation in this region.

CIC creates an environment which encourages the cross-fertilization of ideas and knowledge between entrepreneurs. This is a key reason why CIC has managed to grow and prosper by differentiating itself from its competitors in the flex space market.

Jerzy Brodzikowski, General Manager of CIC Warsaw

CIC currently has over 93,000 sq m of space currently open in 7 cities and will also be opening in Tokyo in Summer 2020. Ultimately, within a decade, the company plans to support development of businesses responding to the changing needs of the world, in as many as 50 cities.

We have chosen Poland as it is an important, expanding market in the CEE region and Europe as a whole. We believe the country has a great deal of untapped potential. We will combine our 20 years of experience in working with the most innovative companies in the world with Poland's significant resource of talent. We will also bring a fresh perspective to a rapidly growing economy. Our goal is to build bridges to facilitate the kind of innovation exchange between the communities that we have created in cities like Boston, Philadelphia, Rotterdam, Miami or Tokyo and will develop in new regional modern business centers such as Warsaw.

Melissa Ablett, CIC’s Head of New Centers for EU & Asia

CIC builds an ecosystem that connects companies at different stages of development – start-ups, scale-ups and mature corporations with incubators, accelerators, the world of science, VC investors, and institutions responsible for development of support programs at both local and national government levels. At the same time, the company introduces its tenants to CIC's global community and works with its non-profit sister organization, Venture Café.

As Venture Café, we are responsible for a number of initiatives that help connect people to make things happen. Our flagship initiative is a free and open frequent networking event focused on innovation. In Warsaw, we have begun hosting monthly meetings called Venture Café Thursday Gathering, which have already attracted almost 3 000 entrepreneurs, investors, students, and members of the innovation community.

Aureliusz Górski, CIC Poland co-founder and Founding Executive Director at Venture Café Warsaw

Since 1999, CIC has hosted over 6,500 companies – from giants such as Microsoft, EY, IBM and L'Oreal to startups such as HubSpot. Google’s Android was developed in CIC's first center in Cambridge. Today Cambridge Innovation Center has over 2,000 tenants representing both commercial and non-profit companies across many industries.

In Poland and the whole CEE region we talk a lot about the middle-income trap. There are several ways to avoid it, but the wisest one is to utilize the growth of Poland's importance in the global economy through the development of local companies. This can be achieved through innovation. But what does this actually mean?

The Polish economy has done all the necessary groundwork over the last 30 years, and we finally have the infrastructure, communication networks and institutions to support fast growth. We are exporting more and provide more advanced services, but predominantly work on innovations from outside of the country. We process them efficiently and are able to improve them. However, we lack our own culture of knowledge creation and development as well as our very own success stories. CIC Warsaw will become a driving force for Poland's entire ecosystem of innovation which will give us the possibility of scaling Polish companies even faster and enable cooperation with companies from both our region and the whole world.

Jerzy Brodzikowski, General Manager of CIC Warsaw

The center will help Polish companies to make their mark on the global markets, become more attractive to VC investments and, what is also very important, change the perception of the country's potential and capabilities. CIC’s infrastructure will provide companies, located in CIC Warsaw, with access to knowledge, trends as well as the global market.

In Warsaw, CIC wants to build a center of knowledge and development, which will empower all sectors related to technology, not only young companies. Large organizations also need particular conditions and inspiration to maintain a competitive edge and expand their operations.

Magdalena Ossowska

Senior Consultant at Linkleaders

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