It all began in the Fall 2023 at the Subcontracting Fair in Tampere. There, leaders from Finland’s technology and manufacturing industries shared a bold idea: to build a unique ecosystem that brings together all the Finnish manufacturing industry value chain´s expertise under one collaborative umbrella. This was not just about creating another ecosystem, it was about unifying our resources towards an important common mission and starting a new kind of industrial business driven community to drive together the future of the manufacturing industry.
June 2024: A Commitment Towards a Common Mission
Early 2024, DIMECC was mandated to coordinate the creation of the new concept. All stakeholders from the different networks and ecosystems existing were invited to participate to the development phase. Focus groups to define strategical and operational directions were created. Interviews were conducted and questionnaires help to gather data to better understand customers´needs.
This intensive development period brought together enthusiastic partners ready to build this new ecosystem from the bottom-up and commit towards a common mission: strengthen Finland’s global competitiveness. And it had been wished by its partner, everything came together on June 18, 2024, when the official MAKE founding sauna-event was held, right before mid-summer.
Seventeen founding partners joined their forces and agreed on the ecosystem’s core themes, operational, financial and governance models. DIMECC was appointed as the official orchestrator, ensuring smooth and clear coordination going forward.
From Vision to Action towards Impact
From the very beginning, its founding partners had a clear vision: build an impactful ecosystem to support smart and sustainable manufacturing through strong collaboration. MAKE is different from any other ecosystem created before. Not only did it gather from the beginning actors throughout the value chain, bringing together both manufacturers and service providers, but also with a strong will to move towards concrete actions.
In just one year, MAKE has enabled:
- The launch of 4 Expert Networks (ExNets) enabling networking and expertise sharing on “Manufacturing, Machining & Materials” (ExNet1), “Design, Quality, Assembly and Logistics” (ExNet2), “Sustainability, Occupational Safety and Health” (ExNet3), and “Data-driven Manufacturing” (ExNet4) that enabled to identify the needs for several co-development initiatives.
- The organization of over 50 collaborative events, including 20 flash webinars, training sessions, factory visits, FIIF sessions, Leader Forums, and other MAKE seminars in different fairs as well as the annual Synergy Summit.
At the heart of all, the importance to reinforce collaboration between different actors that all work towards stronger value chain for the Finnish manufacturing industry. MAKE promotes collective effort through networking and knowledge sharing, co-development and innovation as well as competence development, and strategic influencing actions.
June 2025: MAKE is a Strong Community
In less than one year, MAKE has grown into a community of over 50 committed partners and more than 350 experts. Each one has contributed time, knowledge, and other resources to help shape a smarter and stronger future for the Finnish manufacturing. MAKE is not just a project or a program. It is a living community built on trust and openness and dedicated and committed to work together towards a common mission, vision and strategy. In the next two years, we will make sure we built the best collaboration community because collaboration is our a real competitive advantage.
And this is just the beginning. Fall activities program promises to be full of opportunities, join us, join MAKE in Finland community and show to the rest of the world how impactful one can be, when united.
Let´s MAKE it, together!