This summer, EYnovation, the innovation programme of EY Luxembourg, is joining forces with various local and neighbouring partners to create enriched business opportunities through the first-ever virtual International Matchathon dedicated to logistic players; the event will take place on 26 May 2020.
 
The COVID-19 lockdown has drastically impacted the advanced manufacturing, global supply chains and logistic industry. From end-user demand to supply chain disruptions and plant closures, companies are grappling with the impact and trying to understand the long-term ramifications. Industrial product companies are facing deferred demand, supply disruptions and continued plant closures, impacting availability and creating volatility that could influence retail and purchasing prices dramatically. The outbreak has also caused a significant drop in freight and belly capacity in passenger transport demand, in addition to cancellations of events, impacting airlines, forwarders and transportation companies across the globe.
 
In line with Hackathons which took place all across Europe over the past months and the success of the “Start-upsVSCovid-19” initiative conducted by Ministry of Economy and Luxinnovation, EY Luxembourg, in collaboration with the Cluster for Logistics, the Chamber of Commerce, the Ministry of Mobility and Public Works, the China-Luxembourg Chamber of Commerce (CHINALUX), the Luxembourg Open Innovation Club (LOIC), the House of Startups (HoST) / Luxembourg Chamber of Commerce, the Luxembourg Business Angel Network (LBAN) and the German tech consulting boutique CorpPearls are launching a one-month “Matchathon” on 26 May 2020. The event will bring together international corporations, start-ups and logistics experts who want to work together, emphasise cross-border collaborations and to accelerate solutions and promote innovative ideas that could help the Logistics cluster. The entire initiative will be supported by a collaborative innovation platform, EYCogniStreamer, on which users will join forces to enrich ideas, connect and prepare deployment of innovative solutions.
 
Four milestones will pave the way of the first Logistic Matchathon. Firstly, on 26 May, Corporate and Business Supporters will be invited to share on the platform their pain points, challenges and ideas to express the support offered to the community to enrich these contributions and to create value for the logistics sector.
On 5 June, after ten days of ideas and challenges collection from Corporate and Business Supporters, startups will be invited to bring their solutions on the platform while identifying which ideas, challenges and pain points their solution could cover.
Based upon Corporate and Startups’ interests, preferences and areas of focus, the platform will recommend the best potential matches on 15 June and will propose teams mixing entrepreneurs, corporate’ representatives, industry experts and business supporters. Open for one week, the virtual “Living Lab” will be the space for the different teams to join forces, mixing their experiences and skills to develop enriched business cases and accelerate implementation to tackle down industry challenges! On June 19th each team will be asked to post the final version of their business case and prototype of their solution for review by the jury members.
Finally, on 25 June, following the review of the jury for the need, viability, innovation, urgency and impact of each project based upon current (and future) logistic challenges, the most advanced and creative projects will be invited to join the closing livestream matchmaking event to share their roadmap for succeeding phases, including potential eco system partner needed in front of a panel of international experts of the Logistics community.
Starting 26 June 2020, the organisers will open the “LaunchPad” area where Entrepreneurs and Corporates will co-develop deployment and go-to-market strategy, supported by EY Coaches.