Platform6 recently signed a partnership with Pirkanmaan Osuuskauppa. The collaboration will bring opportunities for both the startups of Platform6, as well as to POK.
Mia Häkkinen works as Business Development Manager at Pirkanmaan Osuuskauppa, and her goal is to improve their current services. “Big part of my mission is to develop new businesses and create collaboration with partners. I also try recognizing the potential new business areas that are linked with our strategy and starting and coordinating projects around those areas.” Mia explains.
For POK, there were multiple reasons to start this kind of collaboration with Platform6. “We have realized that maybe we don’t have all the wisdom, so we need to reach out to our customers and also to new and innovative startups. We have a strong will to know the customers of our area better, including the startup field. We also want to bring new innovations to our business, but we didn’t have a ready-made model for this kind of collaboration. That is why the partnership also offers an opportunity for us to develop our own internal processes to be more agile, and have more of an entrepreneurial spirit.” Mia says.
For startups the partnership has considerable benefits: “We have an enormous network of business locations for the startups to have an opportunity to pilot their products and services. For example Prisma Kaleva alone has 5 million customers a year, so we can do very quick and efficient pilots. Of course the pilots made with us are also significant references for the startups, and there is also a possibility to scale the pilots nationally. We also have advisors and expert knowledge available for the startups who collaborate with us.”
Mia is mostly inspired by the community and the amazing drive at Platform6. “We don’t have resources to start scouting for potential startup partners, so having a large number of startups in the same place helps our operations significantly. Cooperation is also in the heart of our values, and that is why we also want to be a regional support for growing businesses in the area.”
The next steps will include building a POK contact team for the collaboration, so that all of their business areas will be represented, and everyone has an understanding of the benefits of this kind of partnership. “Innovation challenges and hackathons will make the collaboration concrete, and we already have projects we are looking partners for. We find the test kitchen especially interesting. We could for example invite food technology innovation companies and local food producers to make prototypes here with us.”
Mia sees opportunities in the near future: “The dream would be to have new innovations visible for our customers already during this pilot period. Whether they are new products, new partnerships or improvements to customer experience. We want to find solutions that lead to increased well being of our customer-owners and we really enjoy working with startups who want to make the world a better place one step at the time.”
