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During the High-level Directors meeting, Saxony-Anhalt was welcomed as a new member to the Network, which raises the network membership to 35 Regions. Saxony-Anhalt is located in the middle of Germany and integrated into three large-scale CEF transport corridors, and the last 30 years have seen Saxony-Anhalt become a central logistics hub. Bordering on four neighboring federal states – Brandenburg, Saxony, Thuringia and Lower Saxony – Saxony-Anhalt is deeply integrated into the value chains of a number of large businesses in some of Germany’s key industries. The state’s location also means that cooperation comes naturally to regional research and innovation actors.

Based on production, research and innovation output and Saxony-Anhalt’s ongoing process of smart specialization, the best-performing regional sectors are the following:

• Chemicals industry
• Metalworking
• Food and bioeconomy
• Automotive supply industry
• Mechanical engineering
• Renewable and alternative energies

As one of the German cohesion policy transition regions, Saxony-Anhalt is traditionally strongly committed to European cooperation activities on the basis of a balanced funding mix including structural funds. The regional government is also increasingly focused on implementing strategic synergies between the various funds in order to increase the impact of funding programmes and create long-term pathways to research and innovation excellence. Saxony-Anhalts businesses, research organisations and clusters are embedded in a strong and outward-looking regional ecosystem and look forward to providing input to the value chains set up as part of the Vanguard demo-cases.

As a transition region, Saxony-Anhalt is also investing heavily in regional economic transformation in terms of

• substitution of fossil feedstocks with bioeconomy solutions
• creating circular production lifecycles
• finding new approaches for mobility and energy
• enabling key industries’ transition to a digitalised world of industrial intelligence.

The development of new European industrial value chains is particularly essential for Saxony-Anhalt in order to achieve this transformation. For key industrial sectors such as chemicals and automotive engineering, it is crucial to tackle important new technologies such as:

• transformation processes in the bioeconomy, including recycling and newcycling
• storage, distribution and production of green hydrogen
• additive manufacturing and new materials
• industrial IoT, industrial Intelligence/AI and robotics. 

Research and innovation actors from Saxony-Anhalt are interested in expanding their collaboration within the Vanguard Initiative’s Bioeconomy Pilot and forming new partnerships in 3D printing and manufacturing and would also be keen to take the lead in setting up new demo-cases e.g. in algae innovation as part of the circular economy.

For more information on Saxony-Anhalt, please contact David Fenner at the Brussels representation of Saxony-Anhalt.