02.12.2016
ORLEN opens the door to innovators
PKN ORLEN has launched ‘Innovations, Start-ups’, an online cooperation and knowledge sharing-platform devoted to new technological solutions. This modern communication tool, more and more widely embraced by the most innovative companies, is designed to facilitate networking in order to develop innovation, also based on the ‘reverse coaching’ philosophy which brings benefits to both sides. The new website is targeted mainly at the start-up and innovator community and is available at www.innowacje.orlen.pl.
The ‘Innovations, Start-ups’ project will involve different forms of cooperation with innovators. One of them is Innowacje@orlen, an application that can be used to register a proposed innovative solution for any of the key areas of PKN ORLEN’s operations, including Production, Power Generation, or Marketing and Sales. The ‘Accelerator’ and ‘Crowdsourcing’ sections will provide detailed information on PKN ORLEN’s current programmes addressed to inventors, academics and businesses and creating opportunities to present innovative solutions and cooperate closely with PKN ORLEN’s top experts in their implementation.
We hope that the platform will be a bridge connecting our company with start-ups and innovators. We believe that by tapping the external potential and providing different forms of support, some of which are sometimes difficult to access, from specialised laboratory facilities to our extensive retail network in a few countries, we will foster quicker and efficient commercialisation of modern solutions and will effectively contribute to the full utilisation of the innovative and entrepreneurial potential of Poland - says Andrzej Kozłowski, Executive Director for Strategy at PKN ORLEN.
Poland’s competitive advantage lies in its entrepreneurial spirit, but this resource is being slowly depleted. Being aware of those developments, for a number of years now PKN ORLEN, Poland’s largest enterprise with global presence, has engaged in innovative projects and analysed processes on the lookout for potential growth opportunities. Other examples of PKN ORLEN’s initiatives are networking meetings, such as the one held during the 590 Congress in Rzeszów in November 2016, workshops administered by PKN ORLEN experts for Polish start-ups at this year’s ‘Impact’16’ event in Kraków, or a recent successfully completed crowdsourcing project.
In our search for innovation we do not rule out any options − we are looking for new ideas related to the ORLEN Group’s core activities but we also want to consider completely new development directions that could complement our business. In this respect we will focus on start-up scouting, that is actively searching for start-up businesses specialising in selected areas - says Jędrzej Oleszkiewicz, Head of the Innovation Office at PKN ORLEN.
