It’s not just the ski aces who are fighting for the fastest time; clusters are also trying to facilitate innovation, cooperation and company growth more and more effectively. The “Cluster Management Excellence Label” from the European Secretariat for Cluster Analysis (ESCA) is the global standard developed by the EU. The achieved impact, results, leadership, team, co-operation, financing, strategy and services are evaluated in 31 categories. 

The Green Tech Valley cluster consistently holds the highest “Gold Label”, which only 148 of 1,600 audited clusters have received to date. The top score of 100% has only been awarded around five times in 13 years. Green Tech Valley is the only cluster in the world to have achieved this twice in a row after 2018 with the new Gold Label 2024. 

100 per cent record successfully defended

“This global record for Green Tech Valley is of course pleasing. At the same time, it is also an incentive to achieve new top results for green growth in the south of Austria in the future,” says Bernhard Puttinger, Managing Director of the cluster, who thanks all 300 companies, the research institutions, the owners such as the Province of Styria, the Province of Carinthia and the City of Graz and his dedicated team. 

“Achieving this record for excellent cluster work is very rare and extremely remarkable. But to achieve it again is unique,” the auditors state. All the details can be found in the final report from ESCA European Secretariat for Cluster Analysis and VDI/VDE, which is available online. The auditors were particularly impressed by the “outstanding results and impact of the activities”, e.g. in the areas of hydrogen, the circular economy and the green transformation.

Statements:

Barbara Eibinger-Miedl, Styrian Minister of Economic Affairs: “The Green Tech Valley Cluster has been one of the absolute world leaders for many years, as the latest result of the Cluster Management Excellence Label once again impressively demonstrates. Domestic companies and therefore Styria as a business and innovation location as a whole benefit from this high quality. The next step lies in the even better networking of Styria’s economic areas of strength – mobility, green technologies, human technology and microelectronics – but also across provincial borders.”

Helmut Wöginger, VP Global Business Development, ANDRITZ AG: “The cooperation between the companies in Green Tech Valley is working: At ANDRITZ, as a global market leader, this results in innovations for the climate transition such as green hydrogen, CO2 capture or textile recycling.”