The Impactory

Marina Thiriet, project manager at Impactory will present Impactory at ARA Radio at lunch time tomorrow. Stay tuned and listen, what is Impactory, coworking and how it is promoting & helping entrepreneurship in Luxembourg.

In July, instead of our regular community lunch, we will be having a Summer BBQ on July 10th, click below image to get more information & for registration.

Our in-house journalist Katie Nail is following some of the exciting happenings at The Impactory. Read more, below.

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Many things make The Impactory a great place for entrepreneurship, business, and enterprise. Our members, the decor, coffee, and the spirit of the place all contribute to its innovative community. One of the many ways our members “plug in” to the Impactory community is through coworking.

Coworking is sharing a workspace with other people involved in independent work activities. The people sharing the space are not working for the same company but are sharing a space for collaboration, socialization, and their independent work. While every person is working on his or her own business, the effects of working with like-minded individuals is often significant.

To better demonstrate the power of coworking, we’ve interviewed several of our current coworkers and asked them why they like working at The Impactory.

Will Mernagh has been living and working in Luxembourg for almost two years. He writes code for Iora Health based in Boston. When he moved to Luxembourg, he began working remotely. “I would definitely recommend it,” Mernagh says of The Impactory.  “They have a clear distinction between quiet space and social space…it has everything you need.” Because he works east coast hours, he only comes a few times a month but said he makes a point to come for the social interactions.

Roberto Vitón is one of the most frequent coworkers at The Impactory. He coworks about three weeks a month. Vitón set up his own consultancy business last year. He uses his significant background in agriculture to advise fund managers in food and agriculture investment. He has been a member of The Impactory since January after a friend recommended visiting. Vitón says he likes how affordable the coworking space is and said of the Impactory, “Sometimes the good value is in the simple stuff. . . .The whole combination is effective.”  Lean more about his business at www.valoral.com.

Patricio Rubinstein found out about The Impactory from fellow member Roberto Vitón. He has been using The Impactory since September 2013 and has his own business as a consultant. “I really use this as my working space. As I was growing, I didn’t want to get into office commitments, furniture, IT assistance. . . . I want to start small here and also I enjoy the people that come every day.” He prefers to sit upstairs where there is a greater flow of people. He really likes the social side of being at The Impactory and the opportunity it provides to share ideas.

Cristina Picco was looking for a coworking space in Luxembuorg after visiting The Hub in Berlin. Through word of mouth she heard about the Impactory. She has been a member for almost a year, coming three times a week. She likes coworking because it is an easy way to meet people and network. “Being in a network helps a lot . . . it’s a good way to hear about new opportunities and coming out [of the] house to meet people.” Picco is a co-founder of Mamie et Moi, a non-profit that sells baby clothes made by elderly knitters. Learn more about Mamie et Moi at www.mamieetmoi.com.

The Impactory is pleased to offer 1 day of free coworking trial. Do not hesitate to come and enjoy the place!

Please scan this QR Code (or click on it if you cannot scan it), print it and send an email to hello@theimpactory.com to book your day at least 48h in advance. Do not forget to leave us your contact details.

(Offer available 1 time per person until September 30, 2014)

1^st Rails Girls Luxembourg was successful!

A fun and friendly event above all!

 

The 1^st Rails Girls edition took place last week on Friday evening and Saturday in Luxembourg at the Impactory, a co-working place and business incubator at the heart of the city. Rails Girls was born in Finland in 2012, and already took place in more than 100 cities worldwide. The aim is to allow women to learn how to create websites and web applications.

The event gathered about 40 women (from 15 to 59), and 14 volunteer coaches (5 women & 9 men), passionate programmers, who were there to share their knowledge in programming.

The workshop was organised by Marina THIRIET from The Impactory and Claudine Kariger from Service des médias & communications, sponsor of the workshop.

During the weekend, the coaches made an analogy between cooking and programming, which allowed the attendees to better understand the ‘recipe’ to create an app.

 

Creating an app only in few hours!

Far from being a formal training, a variety of activities were offered to the participants with presentations and practical activities. The participants were able to try programming with simple exercises and then later create a web app at their own pace.

The workshop was available in Luxembourgish, English and French. The attendees, beginners and advanced programmers, were introduced to Ruby, an open source computer language created in 2004 which has become very popular supported by a  large community.

 

The attendees were also there to meet new people and see the event as a networking opportunity: ‘I’ve got a great app idea, but I don’t know how to create it’ or ‘I’m working within an IT team, I’m the only girl and I would like to communicate better with my colleagues”

 

‘I am very impressed with the active role that the Luxembourgish Government is taking towards encouraging the female population to broaden their technical horizons. So much lasting goodwill and cohesion came to life during such a short frame of time.

Learning programming has always been on my list of things I would like to learn and it couldn’t have happened at a better time or better place.

If you care to read a brief blog post about the Rails Girls Workshop, I invite you to consult the latest posting on my blog : yvonnekoechig.com
’ – said Yvonne.

 

Happy attendees and new events are likely to happen

Some women already planned to meet each other again, in order to continue working on projects and learn further. Several coaches, who met each other during the event,  got along very well and are now planning to offer new activities to raise awareness of IT for the public: they will of course be welcomed at The Impactory!

We received 80 applications, had to choose the 40 women and selected the most highly motivated.

    

 

 

Marina Thiriet, project manager at Impactory was at Radio 100.7 at 7.30 this morning to talk about first Rails Girls upcoming event in Luxembourg on May 16 & May 17, 2014.
Visit http://railsgirls.com/luxembourg for more information & registration for the event.

At the beginning of April I attended a training called ” Promoting entrepreneurship” at Foundation for Women Entrepreneurs in Malta. This training was funded as part of the European Grundtvig program, now Erasmus +.

I was very interesting to learn more about Malta which I visited for the first time. Malta, an island, is located between Sicilia & the North Africa coast, is also one of the smalest country and densely populated country in the World. Malta joined the European Union just 10 years ago and has two official languages, Maltese and English, both widely spoken.

First of all, do you know the common point between Malta and Luxembourg?
The 2 countries are one of the smallest state of the EU member states with 400 000 (for Malta) and 500 000 inhabitants (Luxembourg).

I choose the Foundation for Women Entrepreneurs in Malta to follow a training on ” How to promote the culture of entrepreneurship” which seems very interesting & relevant do what we do here at the Impactory. The 5-day training focused on introducing entrepreneurship as a way of life, sharing of success stories and visits to real life projects and organisations that assist start-ups & SMEs

I was welcomed by MaryRose who is the Executive manager for the foundation and used to be an entrepreneur and started to work for the Foundation 11 years ago supporting other women in entrepreneurship and taking part in great projects accross the EU.

Even if the course was not solely focused on Women entrepreneurship, the gender subject was important for me. Indeed, I learned that being a Women and an entrepreneur is very uncommon in Malta. Even if very educated or in sucessful career, most of Maltese mums tend to to stay at home after the birth of their first child. As in Luxembourg and probably eveywhere else in the World, the Foundation notices that women lack of confidence and support, think they do not have the skills to start a business (event if they do) and often feel guilty to spend more time at work than at home with their family.

I also had the chance to visit one of the national Business incubator, Kordin Business Incubation Centre (KBIC), ran by Malta Enterprise, which host more than 10 young innovative companies. KBIC provides a cost-effective business environment, a professional image with managerial expertise geared to the needs of small business. The business incubated there are mainly in the field of Maritime, ITC & Biotech. The manager, Steve, explained that Malta welcome entrepreneurs from all over Europe. Entrepreneur may relocate to Malta to enjoy the sunny climate but also because Malta is the perfect EU State to do business with North Africa (Malta is only 600 km away from Tripoly) and The Middle East.

I also had the chance to meet the people at E-skills fondation and MITA (Malta Information Technology agency) and we discuss the opportunity to partner on a project on e-skills and coding, field we have been very active in at The Impactory. I was also pleased to meet with Matthew Gatt, chairman of the foundation & EU Code week ambassador for Malta (I am EU Code Week ambassador for Luxembourg since last year).

On my last day I had the pleasure to train with Angela the President of the Foundation. She introduced me to the possibility of EU fundings for education, SME and innovation. She also took me through Eramus + in details as well as Horizon 2020. I found this overview very interesting and I hope we will have the chance to get more involved at The Impactory in the future.

Finally, I was lucky to be able to visit the beautiful capital city of Valletta, Sliema & had the best business lunch in the superb ancient capital Mdina on the last day.

The training has been really beneficial in terms of learning how to promote the culture of entrepreneurship, exchanging experience, and discovering the culture and the context of a other European country. It was also a great opportunity to meet interesting people and generate new contacts for potential future projects.I certainly will be back in Malta and will keep in touch with the team at The Foundation. No doubt that this week has created a great connexion between The Impactory in Luxembourg & several new partners in Malta.

Marina THIRIET

Maria Luisa Ferreira Head of Social Program, EIB Institue mentioned Impactory as mentoring institute for EIB European Social Innovation Award

“Maria Luisa Ferreira: «Ce mentoring a été mis en place par Impactory, une asbl luxembourgeoise». (source: Paperjam 04.23.2014)”

Read the full article on http://www.paperjam.lu/questions/le-concours-cible-la-creation-de-valeur-sociale