Creative Spark: New Enterprise Partnership Between Kent and Azerbaijan

Kent Business School (KBS) has been successfully selected by the British Council to work with ADA University and Azerbaijan State University of Culture and Arts, both based in Baku, to support student entrepreneurship in the creative sectors.

The Creative Spark: Higher Education Enterprise Programme is a five-year initiative which aims to support the international university and institutional partnerships to develop enterprise skills and a creative economy across seven countries in Central Asia (Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, and Kyrgyzstan), South Caucasus (Azerbaijan, Armenia, Georgia) and Ukraine through UK support.

The programme has been developed in response to an underdeveloped creative sector and demand for entrepreneurship training in the programme countries, supporting wealth and job creation. The University of Kent will be working with partners to help establish approaches and programme structure based on the highly successful Business Start-Up Journey Programme (BSUJ) delivered by the ASPIRE team at KBS.

‘Creative Spark provides an excellent framework to develop our international partnership,’ said David Williamson, Director of External Services at KBS.Azerbaijan also offers a great opportunity for our students interested in starting a business to connect with their counterparts in Baku. We are looking forward to working with our new partners. There is a great deal to learn from each other and I’m certain this is only the beginning of a longer-term partnership.’

Nargiz Ismayilova, Director, Centre of Excellence in EU Studies, ADA University, Baku, agrees, ‘Creative Spark is a unique opportunity for us to create a platform for Azerbaijani students where their creative initiatives perfectly match business ones. Moreover, they will do that in partnership with students from the University of Kent. Besides, our cooperation with a British university will be consolidated through the project, and we believe this is just initial steps and there is more to go.’

Azerbaijan partners will be able to learn more about the BSUJ approach at the launch of the University of Kent’s annual Business Start-Up Day on October 23rd.

For further information please contact David Williamson at d.williamson@kent.ac.uk

If you want more information on how to get involved with the Business Start-Up Journey please contact the ASPIRE team.

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