In episode #232 of The Grant, I’m joined by Alina Totti from Provincie Noord-Brabant for a conversation about something that often gets too little attention in the funding world: what has to be built before the proposal even exists. Alina works at the intersection of international relations, European funding, innovation and regional strategy in one of Europe’s most innovation-driven regions. Noord-Brabant is home to a strong advanced manufacturing ecosystem and to globally known industrial players such as Philips, ASML and NXP. But the point of the episode is not just that Brabant is successful. It is how a region like that builds its position deliberately through storytelling, relationship-building, smart specialisation and long-term engagement with Brussels.

What makes the episode especially useful is that Alina explains the layers underneath EU funding. We talk about smart specialisation as a shared language between regions, the role of the Vanguard Initiative as both collaboration platform and political instrument, and how interregional trust has to be built long before a call opens. We also go into the practical side of ecosystem-building: creating stepping-stone instruments like Vinnovate, helping SMEs find partners, aligning regional strengths with European priorities, and understanding that successful EU funding often starts years earlier with relationships, positioning and strategic timing. This becomes a conversation not just about one Dutch region, but about how regions can create the conditions that make European funding possible in the first place.

Time codes:

01:39 Guest introduction and fly in

06:21 What Provincie Noord-Brabant is

13:36 The Vanguard Initiative and Smart Specialisation

35:05 The Importance of Relationships

51:14 Long-Term Lobbying and Why the Region Invests in It

01:08:33 Reflections and advice

01:10:45 The toughest challenge