To promote the continuous innovation, growth, and development of social enterprises in Taiwan and to encourage young people to join social enterprises, the Executive Yuan approved the Project for Social Enterprises Action Plan in September 2014. In order to facilitate the implementation of the plan, the Small and Medium Enterprise Administration of the Ministry of Economic Affairs commissioned KPMG in 2014 to be in charge of its execution. Three consecutive social enterprise conventions will be held in Northern, Central, and Southern Taiwan from Dec. 11 onwards, to consolidate social enterprise resource networks from various industries in Taiwan and link up social enterprises in different locations to build a social enterprise network platform. Experts and scholars will be invited to share on an array of topics and local social enterprises will gather to share their management experiences, facilitating an exchange of opinions on this platform.
The first activity, the Central Taiwan social enterprises convention, was held at 2 pm on Dec. 11 at the Taichung City Love Home B1 auditorium. This convention was held in collaboration with the Feng Chia University Research Institute of Social Entrepreneurship. Developers of Taiwan social enterprises were specially invited to participate and share their knowledge at the convention. Invitees included Executive Yuan administrative committee member Feng Yan, who has been an important figure in the promotion of Taiwan social enterprises. Feng spoke on the topic of “current status and development of social enterprises in Taiwan” and subsequently interacted with convention participants. Professor Wang Hao from the Feng Chia University will share his views on the current status and development of international social enterprises. In addition, tens of social enterprises from Central Taiwan will briefly share their company position, core abilities, and the current market situation. The convention seeks to engage social enterprises, potential social enterprises, and peripheral support units in Central Taiwan to foster mutual learning and growth through participants' sharing of management experience, technological innovations, capital and resources. Mutual learning and sharing will be conducted to help discover the unique and favorable environments for social enterprises and create a mutual learning platform in Central Taiwan, which will in turn drive the growth of social enterprises.
The Northern Taiwan social enterprise convention will be held on Dec. 14 at 2 pm in the Non-Zero restaurant. This event is held with special assistance from Crosspoint, a well-known social group in Taiwan. Social enterprises under three different development stages will be invited to share, including Yao Meng-hong (Rich; creator of Goods for Free, a startup with social enterprising spirit), social entrepreneur Lin Qiu-ji (George, creator of CAN), and renowned social entrepreneur Sun Xi-jun (Jack; CEO of Canbran International). By having social enterprises from the different stages of social enterprise development share their business and corporate management experience, this convention is expected to help expand cooperation between social enterprises and medium and large companies.
Interactions between startups can increase opportunities for large and small scale cooperation, shape and drive the social enterprising spirit of startups. They can also help to match social enterprises, startups, and medium and large companies together. Exchange platforms can be leveraged on to share and spread the spirit of social enterprises, consolidate government resources and venture capital, strengthen Taiwanese social enterprises and provide them with a wider array of information and assistance.
The Southern Taiwan social enterprise convention will be held on Dec. 20 (Sat.) at 2 pm at the South Wing of the Kaohsiung City National Science and Technology Museum (Room S107). This convention is hosted by the Sun Yat-Sen Management Education Foundation, which has invited the secretary-general of the Taiwan Venture Capital Association, Su Shi-zhong, who has many years of experience in Taiwan's venture capital investing and angel investing scene. Secretary-General Su will speak on social enterprises from a venture capital perspective. There will also be five groups of social enterprise teams conducting presentations, and three expert scholars and venture capitalists giving recommendations on future management. Immediate feedback from expert scholars and interactions between participants is an excellent avenue for mutual learning and growth, and this convention is expected to serve as an exchange platform for Southern Taiwan social enterprises. It will integrate different industries and resource networks by linking Southern Taiwan social enterprise startups with venture capitalists and facilitate the sharing of business experience between local students, teachers and entrepreneurs.
Furthermore, the Project for Social Enterprise Action Plan promoted by the Small and Medium Enterprise Administration in 2014 will commence with the nurturing of social enterprises and providing them with the necessary capital; fundamental research for social enterprises will also be conducted. Benchmark social enterprises will be selected for case studies and used as learning models for other social enterprises. The National Taipei University of Technology will also host the "Discover the Future Star of Social Enterprises Demo Day, Publicity Campaign, and Seminar" on 16th Dec, where renowned social enterprise experts will be invited to make keynote speeches, share social enterprise innovation methods and directions for future development. This will improve understanding between the government and the public. Eight social enterprises with good potential will also be selected to conduct demo shows in the hopes of attracting potential investors and extend the benefits of model learning.
The Small and Medium Enterprise Administration will continue to work with relevant departments, industries, and academia to manage program strategies for regulations, platform building, fund raising, and nurturing of social enterprises. This will complement the development of social enterprises and achieve the Social Enterprise Action Plan objectives, including providing a friendly social enterprise development environment, building social enterprise networks and platforms, strengthening social enterprise management, and building an ecological environment in Taiwan that is beneficial to social enterprise innovation, establishment, growth, and development.