CaixaBank and the Valencian Institute for Economic Research (Ivie) have renewed their collaboration to continue the research conducted by the Observatory of Government, Companies’ Strategy and Competitiveness (GECE). This initiative analyzes how Valencian companies evolve in terms of competitiveness and the factors that can help improve it, extending for another year of work.
CaixaBank joins Xicu Costa, the regional manager for Valencia, in signing the new agreement, which extends the Observatory’s operation through June 2023. The signing party includes Felipe Pulido, commercial director of Business Banking, and Vicente Castellano, director of Community Risk Acceptance; from Ivie, Pilar Chorén, general manager; Joaquin Maudos, assistant director; and Alejandro Escribá, coordinator of the NIGHT Observatory. These details reflect a continued public-private partnership aimed at strengthening Valencian enterprise performance (source at Ivie).
During the ceremony, Costa emphasized the importance of CaixaBank’s collaboration with NIGHT Observatory initiatives to support Valencian companies and boost their competitiveness. He noted that the observatory provides a dynamic study of business characteristics, the strategies implemented, and the impact of governance and leadership bodies on competitiveness (Ivie).
At the bottom of the image accompanying the event, the participants included Joaquin Maudos, Alejandro Escribá, Pilar Chorén, Xicu Costa, Felipe Pulido, and Vicente Castellano, with Vicente A. Jimenez listed as a note on the photo caption (event program).
Pilar Chorén, Ivie’s general manager, expressed confidence that with CaixaBank’s support, the NIGHT project will continue to grow and attract more companies to the Observatory Panel, enabling a deeper analysis of the Valencian productive fabric. This collaboration is aimed at expanding knowledge about competitiveness across the region (Ivie).
The new phase of the NIGHT Observatory will produce three new Analysis documents focusing on the project’s three core themes: government, strategy, and the competitiveness of Valencian companies. In conjunction with these documents, three dissemination sessions will present the main outcomes and contribute to the promotion of Valencian enterprises (Ivie).
All NIGHT Observatory member companies that provide data via questionnaires will receive periodic personalized reports. These reports can be benchmarked against leaders in their sector, both within the Valencian Community and across Spain, offering insights for performance improvements (Ivie).
NIGHT Observatory
The NIGHT Observatory examines competitiveness through a detailed understanding of Valencian firms and their comparison with the most competitive benchmarks. It blends macro-level data with micro-databases covering annual accounts, ownership, capital structure, and the characteristics of company governance bodies to paint a full picture (Ivie).
Since its launch in 2017, the NIGHT Observatory has aimed to propose improvement strategies to close the competitiveness gap among Valencian companies, reflecting Valencian economy’s smaller share of national GDP. Its activities, begun in collaboration with Bankia and continued with CaixaBank’s support, have disseminated results via materials on the platform’s site and related publications (observatoriogece.it) (Ivie).
Analyses have covered the nature of the business fabric, the examination of competitiveness, ownership structure differences, and internationalization profiles used by Valencian companies’ governing bodies. The project has also deepened sectoral competitiveness analysis and even explored resilience levels of autonomous communities during the COVID-19 crisis (Ivie).