BUSINESS: 338 PRACTICES
National Bank of Greece leads the largest financial group in Greece and SE Europe, boasting a dynamic presence in 12 countries. Altogether, it runs 10 banks and 62 financial organizations.
Read more: www.nbg.gr
NBG Business Seeds is a program that supports innovative and extroverted entrepreneurship. At the same time it highlights innovative ideas and projects, trains and guides teams, but also provides infrastructure, networking and funding.
Innovative and outgoing entrepreneur.
Lasting.
NBG Business Seeds (www.nbg.gr/nbgseeds) is an integrated program of the National Bank, with the aim of supporting innovative and extroverted entrepreneurship. It includes actions to finance, accelerate, highlight and promote innovative ideas and companies, train and mentor, provide infrastructure and network.
NBG Business Seeds completed 12 years of operation in 2021 and has been awarded as the best initiative to strengthen the Innovation ecosystem, while it has allocated over €5.5 million in investments and important partnerships.
National Bank participates as a private investor in venture capital companies, within the Equifund Fund of Funds. These investments ranked NBG as the second largest private investor in Greece, after the EIF.
NBG Business Seeds approved participations in the equity capital of 11 companies, amounting to €2.46 million, while the lending of 7 companies amounted to €3.1 million. Also, prizes of €539,000 were given to the 110 winning teams and the companies of innovation & technology competitions.
NBG Business Seeds completed 12 years of operation in 2021 and has allocated over €5.5 million in investments and important partnerships.
The Greek territory.
As part of the operation of NBG Business Seeds, its executives participate in the Advisory Board of OK!Thess and the Archimedes Center of EKPA. They also participate in the Education, Innovation & Entrepreneurship Committee of the Hellenic-American Chamber, as well as the Startups Committee of the Hellenic-German Chamber. It has also signed a memorandum of cooperation with the Ministry of Development to support the Elevate Greece initiative. In addition, a memorandum of cooperation has been signed with OTE Group and Bayer Hellas, while the program's cooperation with Microsoft and Grant Thornton has been renewed. In addition, the program continued to work with faculty members of 11 universities to evaluate the 250 proposals submitted in the context of the 12th Innovation & Technology Competition.
The 12th NBG Business Seeds Innovation & Technology Competition was attended by 423 people with 250 proposals.It is worth mentioning that during the 12-year operation of the program, a total of 7,209 people participated with 4,201 proposals. Of the competition winners, 30% are still operating, while 19% have been funded by VCs.
National Bank and NBG Business Seeds have actively supported Elevate Greece, the National Register of Young Enterprises, since its inception, while it also participated in the Evaluation Committee for inclusion of companies in the Register and in the jury of the National Young Entrepreneurship Awards. In the context of the Young Entrepreneurship award ceremony at the 85th TIF, they awarded an amount of €10,000 for the award of the "Business Development and Extroversion" award. 1,400 people participated in the 2021 round of Innovation Days in Athens and the Region. 4 more webinars were organized in Athens, Thessaloniki, Heraklion and Patras, where 235 institutions, companies, universities and research centers participated in 32 panels, lasting 20 hours, on topics related to innovation.
Bootcamps:
During 2021, due to the restrictions of the COVID-19 pandemic, the first online bootcamp of selected groups of the 11th Innovation & Technology competition of the Business Seeds program of the National Bank was organized, where 35 groups attended 21 seminars, which were carried out with the help of 11 agencies.
Greek Fintech hub initiative (fintechhub.gr)
NBG Business Seeds collaborated with 6 other institutions and created the Greek Fintech Hub initiative, an action to finance and support fintech in Greece and the developing economies of SE Europe.
Participation in actions of other bodies
National Bank and NBG Business Seeds are actively involved in public dialogue and information about the innovation ecosystem and technology transfer. In this context, he collaborated with French Tech, the Agricultural University of Athens, the National Technical University of Athens, the Democritus University of Thrace, etc., while he also had an important presence at TIF, where he presented NBG Business Seeds and the Greek Fintech hub.
Be digital speeches
NBG Business Seeds organized events within the be.digital of National Bank, on the new trends in banking, where the program partners VISA, Microsoft, Accenture, EY, Mastercard and ICAP participated.
NBG Business Seeds Awards
NBG Business Seeds was awarded by the Hellenic Innovation Forum & Awards 2021, for its 12-year contribution to the innovation of our country.
As part of the operation of NBG Business Seeds, its executives participate in the Advisory Board of OK!Thess and the Archimedes Center of EKPA. They also participate in the Education, Innovation & Entrepreneurship Committee of the Hellenic-American Chamber, as well as the Startups Committee of the Hellenic-German Chamber. It has also signed a memorandum of cooperation with the Ministry of Development to support the Elevate Greece initiative. In addition, a memorandum of cooperation has been signed with OTE Group and Bayer Hellas, while the program's cooperation with Microsoft and Grant Thornton has been renewed. In addition, the program continued to work with faculty members of 11 universities to evaluate the 250 proposals submitted in the context of the 12th Innovation & Technology Competition.
Strengthening the Bank's ESG profile, while strengthening innovative and extroverted entrepreneurship.
