The project will establish an overall structure in Eastern Sweden with quality-assured processes and methods to create recurring collaboration between academia and industry/community. Today, large companies and organisations are involved in collaboration.The project will therefore develop methods that suit SME, which match their needs with academic competence and create conditions for concrete collaborations. The innovation offices at the three collaborative universities in Uppsala, Linköping and Örebro currently have different methods that connect the needs of business and society with research and education. Funding instruments to stimulate collaboration have also been developed. The project will test and validate methods and funding instruments for dissemination to the entire Öms region, while competence building through knowledge exchange takes place at higher education institutions’ innovation offices. With an Öms-common toolkit, the project contributes to a broader business engagement and more opportunities for companies to collaborate with the region’s large companies and universities than just what is closest.