From the initial identification of 65 companies, 51 have been contacted via phone, email and the “Encuentro de Empresarios Riojanos Innovadores” business innovation conference held on 25 February. The purpose of this contact was to inform companies about the leadership proposals for the Seventh Framework Programme action.

Given the interest of 31 companies, one or more personal interviews were subsequently held with the individual companies in order to identify potential project ideas and establish their viability. After these meetings, a preliminary selection of ideas was made with 11 companies in order to prioritise project ideas.

Calls for proposals for the Seventh Framework Programme are also being identified so that project ideas can be launched for them, although there have not been any calls for the most part of 2008 that would have allowed participation of the project ideas identified by the companies of La Rioja due to their topics.

Work is currently underway to prepare ten project ideas for ten companies.