On 13-15 November, the SME Assembly featured workshops on subjects such as sustainable enterprises, upskilling for a data-driven future, and navigating cultural change in enterprises as well as fostering entrepreneurial spirit, investing in skills, supporting digital transition, improving business environments and inclusive entrepreneurship. One of the highlights of the SME Assembly was certainly the visit of Enrico Letta, the Council’s independent rapporteur for the future of the Single Market. You can watch his interview here. As every year, the assembly was also the moment to celebrate excellence in enterprise promotion with the European Enterprise Promotion Awards. And we are very proud of the association with the Federation of European Securities Exchanges – FESE and European Issuers and their small- and mid-caps awards of excellence on Europe’s stock markets.

On Wednesday, GROW handed the baton over to the Enterprise Europe Network (EEN) for their Annual Conference. EEN is the largest European business support network consisting of 3000 experts from 450 organisations in almost 70 countries, including innovation and regional development agencies, chambers of commerce, technology centres and research institutes. Under the title "The EEN at 15: Showing the Way Forward for SMEs", the three-day conference focussed on how the network's business support services can best meet the changing needs of SMEs, while also celebrating the network's 15th anniversary. This year's edition brought together 800 participants in Bilbao and around 200 online to discuss the EEN's ongoing efforts to support SMEs in innovating, expanding internationally and fostering cross-border cooperation, and to create synergies between network members. Many success stories on how the EEN has supported European SMEs were also presented and the best ones have been awarded during the closing session.

The European SME Week 2023 was one of the most successful events of this kind, thanks to the Spanish Presidency of the Council, the Basque Country, the EEN and GROW teams working tirelessly for SMEs. You can see all the videos of the SME Assembly on the youtube channel Promoting Enterprise and the opening and closing session of the EEN Annual Conference on the EEN YouTube channel.