Creating innovative businesses and/or developing an innovative idea
Do you have a business start-up or innovation project? Join our incubators/accelerators at IMT Nord Europe!
IMT Nord Europe’s incubators/accelerators focus on supporting projects with strong technical and/or scientific potential in the areas of excellence supported by the school at one of our six sites (Douai, Lille, Valenciennes, Dunkerque, Saint-Omer and Alençon).
Our three research centers cover a wide range of cutting-edge scientific topics, all of which are sources of added value:
- Artificial intelligence, optimization, big data and forecasting
- Autonomous and distributed systems
- Imaging, augmented reality, human-machine interfaces
- Automation, sensors, electronics
- Indoor and outdoor air quality
- Industry 4.0
- Energy efficiency
- Advanced materials and manufacturing processes
- The circular economy and eco-design
- Digital hardware and processes
Energy & Environment
Digital Systems
Materials and Processes
IMT Nord Europe’s incubators are ideal meeting places for project coordinators, start-ups, students, doctoral and post-doctoral students, researchers, entrepreneurs and business creators in the Hauts-de-France region.
Our incubator/accelerator provides the high-performance support your project needs.
- Our experienced project managers will provide you with expertise, an outside perspective and support throughout the life of your project.
Our locations
IMT Nord Europe’s incubators have strong local roots and aim to contribute to economic vitality, job creation and development through innovation.
Find us at our three sites:
- Douai: IMT Nord Europe, Centre de recherche, 764, Boulevard Lahure, 59508 Douai (since 1984)
- Saint-Omer: IMT Nord Europe, Incubateur de Saint-Omer, place du 8 mai 1945, Bâtiment La Station, 62500 Saint-Omer (since May 2023)
- Lille: Cité scientifique Rue Guglielmo Marconi, 59650 Villeneuve-d’Ascq
How to join
Joining the Incubator/Accelerator is free of charge. Our status as a public institution allows us to offer this service at no cost.
Joining the incubator is easy. First, contact one of our account managers:
- In Douai and Lille: incubateur@imt-nord-europe.fr
- In Saint-Omer: incubateur-saint-omer@imt-nord-europe.fr
Simply give us a quick presentation of your project and the people behind it.
We will be in touch with you soon so that we can get to know you better and discuss the various stages involved in joining one of our incubators. This stage is called pre-incubation and lasts between one and six months.
You will then be invited to appear before a selection panel made up of experts from our research laboratories and experts in innovative business start-ups. This stage is essential because it consolidates your approach to joining our incubators and allows us to gauge your support needs.
To join IMT Nord Europe’s incubators, you can also apply to our annual “Up to Start by IMT” start-up recruitment competition or through the French Tech Tremplin scheme.
The IMT Nord Europe incubator program is open to all: scientific staff, students and graduates, jobseekers, employees, self-employed entrepreneurs and companies – in short, anyone with a technological project.
Incubation
Incubation takes the form of a support agreement signed with the school and the innovation project coordinator (creator or entrepreneur).
We support projects for a period of 18 months (that can be renewed for six months).
Our specific services include:
- Support from experienced account managers (or external experts) on all aspects of the project: business model, value proposition, market research, business plan, legal aspects, intellectual property, etc.
- Access to regional innovation funds for projects prior to creation.
- Access to all the academic programs and to the network of regional innovation parks approved by the Hauts-de-France region.
Meanwhile, we put your project in touch with the faculty and researchers who are the most relevant to your problem, so that we can identify any technological obstacles and ways of solving them. We facilitate technology transfers.
All incubated/accelerated projects have privileged access to the school’s resources with skills training for project coordinators:
- Facilities
- Industrial FabLabs and qualified teaching staff
- Technology labs and platforms
Joining IMT Nord Europe’s incubators means gaining access to high-quality scientific, technological and managerial skills so you can participate and succeed in the wonderful human adventure of entrepreneurship and innovation development.
Personalized support for your innovation project
- Specific support for each project coordinator, with advice from experts in innovative business creation and development, regular coaching meetings to help you assess the idea as well as any opportunities, design your solution and/or services, and secure each stage of your project (from idea to market launch).
- R&D support: access to human resources trained in research and teaching to help project coordinators expand their skills, privileged access to technology platforms and research centers to prototype and explore innovations (creators and entrepreneurs), access to industrial fablabs and prototyping and pre-production halls.
- Monitoring and operational assistance in preparing grant applications and ensuring the feasibility and development of innovations (BPI, region, competitions, etc.).
- Access to specific IMT funding measures: zero-interest loans, IMT Bercy and Carnot prizes, technology transfer grants.
- Support at events and trade fairs (Vivatech, Bits and Bretzels, etc.).
- Accommodation in private or open-plan offices at our various sites in the Hauts-de-France region; access to meeting rooms, event facilities and common areas.
- Access to networks of students and alumni, mentors, consultants and start-ups within IMT Nord Europe’s national network of 12 incubators to help you carry out your projects and build your teams.
- Access to documents in the social sciences and humanities and all the skills of our teaching, research and innovation centers: Cobaz, Hal, Engineering techniques…
Excubation
Support for business innovation projects.
Experienced teams at your service
