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Open innovation
Open to finding ideas that will help us to grow
We have adopted an open innovation model that makes it possible to create the best solutions, products and services with a view to transforming the current energy model.
Aligned with the Sustainable Development Goals
Sustainable development goals
SDG 9: Industry, innovation and infrastructure
SDG 11: Sustainable cities and communities
Open innovation is a new model used by companies in their relations with external players (universities, start-ups, research centres, other companies in the same or a different sector, etc.) that promotes collaboration and idea sharing.
At Endesa we have adopted this open model to find quality ideas that will help us to grow. Our purpose when entering this new culture is to develop innovative solutions that are capable of transforming the current energy model.
Open Innovability, the digital door open to sustainable innovation
Open Innovability is the digital platform on which we foster a culture of innovation inside and outside the Enel Group. By using it, employees, start-ups, independent innovators, universities, research centres, companies, NGOs and associations can propose innovative and sustainable ideas or projects that seek to respond to different energy-related challenges.
During 2020, multiple new challenges have arisen in relation to topics as varied as renewable installations, security, solutions for people with disabilities, smart cities, people with disabilities or the digital experience with customers. These challenges encompass all the needs of Sustainability, Environment, Generation, Distribution and both residential and corporate customers.
Workshop at Enel Madrid Innovation Hub
Endesa and entrepreneurs: attracting external talent
We wish to encourage communication and collaboration with entrepreneurs and start-ups, due to their capacity for disruptive innovation, their use of technology, their know-how and, above all, their ability to develop and bring products and services to market in the shortest possible time.
Endesa, as part of the Enel Group, is open to the global ecosystem of innovation and entrepreneurship through the 10 Enel Innovation Hubs and 20 startup laboratories. These Enel Innovation Hubs are located in important entrepreneurship centres and the Group’s strategic markets around the world: Brazil, Chile, Israel, Italy, Russia, Spain and the United States.
Madrid is home to the Enel Innovation Hub Europe, located in TheCube Madrid, a space created by and for entrepreneurs with a focus on the Internet of Things, Data Science and Artificial Intelligence, from where they prospect for European startups and develop relationships with the main innovation ecosystems of the continent for the entire Group. European ecosystems are highly relevant within Enel's innovation strategy. Of the nearly 300 collaborations that Enel has established with startups globally, more than 170 have been with startups in this region.
Throughout 2020, ENEL Group has maintained its engagement with entrepreneurship ecosystems, leveraging digital communication channels; and this has led to prospecting more than 2,600 solutions developed by startups and SMEs around the world. Of these, more than 190 were from Spain and Portugal. Furthermore, more than 60 partnerships with start-ups and SMEs have been activated around the world, of which seven were with Spanish start-ups.
ReShape, an opportunity to imagine a new energy
ReShape is a call for applications from startups, SMEs and other actors in the world of open innovation to invite them, through specific challenges, to imagine new ways of developing the energy business. The objective of this initiative is to help boost energy transition by putting innovation at the service of sustainability (Innovability).
The challenges that Endesa and Enel launch in the call for applications are published on the group's startup website and cover all business lines, from power generation to the creation of new value-added products and services, including technologies such as robotics, artificial intelligence and virtual reality.
The culture of innovation: Idea Hub
To promote the creation of a culture of innovation among our employees as a key change factor, we created Enel Idea Hub Spain, a unit dedicated to promoting the use of creative methodologies, entrepreneurship projects and training programmes in specific innovative tools.
Programmes:
Make It Happen
Our “intrapreneurship” programme gives employees an opportunity to become entrepreneurs within the company with operational innovation projects and new business models. These can be implemented in collaboration with a professional accelerator.
Challenge Driven Sessions
Workshops on the application of innovative methodologies to searching for innovative solutions to the company's challenges. In 2019, 34 sessions were held in which 14 challenges were addressed, involving more than 400 employees.
Innovation Ambassadors Network
A programme launched in 2019 in which our employees act as drivers of innovation within their own fields. Those interested receive voluntary special training on becoming part of the network.
Innovation Flow
An employer branding initiative that came out of the ‘Flow Your Talent’ concept with the aim of continuing to involve young talents, foster their growth and promote innovative ideas of use to the company. In 2019, as part of this project, 15 young people faced the Enel X challenge.
Innovation Academy
With the aim of promoting an innovative, agile work space, a specific training programme was created to train employees in work methodologies and skills, so that they could become facilitators of the culture of innovation and entrepreneurship.