Impact studies 2012 to 2025
Since 2012, Tango&Scan has proved its worth
Created in 2012 by the Strasbourg Urban Community, now the Eurometropolis, Tango&Scan supports projects run by two or more partners from the creative industries, the digital sector and traditional sectors. Four studies by BETA (University of Strasbourg / CNRS) have measured what the scheme actually delivers for the area.
- 693applications submitted
- 282winning projects
- €4Minvested over 14 editions
- ≈ €3of turnover for every €1 of public money
- 123jobs created or maintained
The key points in four messages
Four million euros in total over fourteen editions is modest on the scale of a public policy. The effects measured are out of all proportion to that amount. All the estimates below were made on a deliberately conservative basis: they are floors, not ceilings.
Every public euro brings in three
Over 2012 to 2023, the turnover generated by beneficiaries reaches at least 5.4 million euros, and 6.3 to 9.5 million depending on the extrapolation assumptions. Each job costs around 16,700 euros in funding.
The leverage grows stronger over time
Between the first period evaluated (2012 to 2016) and the second (2017 to 2023), the economic ratio improves and the cost per job is halved.
The local fabric grows denser
The scheme gets players working together who would not naturally cross paths. More than a third of winners sign their very first collaboration through it, and the cumulative community is close to 550 different stakeholders.
Without it, the projects would not exist
Asked what would have happened to their project without Tango&Scan, 99 to 100% of winners say it would not have seen the light of day or would have remained far smaller than it became.
01
How Tango&Scan works
The scheme was created in 2012 by the Strasbourg Urban Community (CUS), which became the Eurometropolis of Strasbourg in 2015 and remains its main funder. The accro association runs it: reviewing applications, organising the jury, supporting the winners.
Tango&Scan draws on Dutch and British creative vouchers, with one difference of principle: it does not fund isolated players but marriages between partners from different worlds. It is the partnerships that are rewarded, not individual projects, in order to spark encounters between sectors that otherwise ignore each other for the rest of the year.
Economic
Innovation, value creation and jobs in the creative and digital sectors.
Ecosystemic
A denser web of partnerships between players and sectors across the area.
Cultural
Support for projects at the junction of business and artistic models.
693 applications for 282 winners, i.e. around 4 applications selected out of 10. Demand remains strong and steady. Since 2022, the number of winners has been narrowed to 14 to 16 a year, compared with around twenty before, with a stable budget.
Between 200,000 and 386,000 euros depending on the year, for a total of 4,003,000 euros.
Details of the 14 editions
Theme, applications, winners, grants and stakeholders per edition. EMS: Eurometropolis of Strasbourg. Source: Tango&Scan database (accro).
| Year | Edition | Theme | Appl. | Winners | Grants | Stakeholders |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2012 | TS1 | Open theme | 58 | 20 | €200,000 | CUS, Iconoval |
| 2013 | TS2 | Open theme | 48 | 21 | €220,000 | CUS |
| 2014 | TS3 | Open Data | 41 | 23 | €270,000 | CUS, DIRECCTE |
| 2015 | TS4 | Open theme | 72 | 17 | €260,000 | EMS, DIRECCTE |
| 2016 | TS5 | E-tourism | 56 | 22 | €295,000 | EMS |
| 2017 | TS6 | Smart mobility | 49 | 31 | €354,000 | EMS, Metz, Nancy |
| 2018 | TS7 | Green economy | 60 | 26 | €386,000 | EMS, Metz, Nancy, Mulhouse Alsace |
| 2019 | TS8 | Open theme | 52 | 22 | €346,000 | EMS, Metz, Nancy, Mulhouse Alsace |
| 2020 | TS9 | Open theme | 67 | 22 | €346,000 | EMS, Metz, Nancy, Mulhouse Alsace |
| 2021 | TS10 | Space data | 41 | 20 | €314,000 | EMS, Metz, Nancy, CNES, Booster RhineSpace |
| 2022 | TS11 | Green theme | 39 | 14 | €250,000 | EMS, Karlsruhe |
| 2023 | TS12 | Reading our world | 30 | 14 | €262,000 | EMS, Karlsruhe |
| 2024 | TS13 | Artificial intelligence | 31 | 14 | €250,000 | EMS, Karlsruhe, EM Strasbourg |
| 2025 | TS14 | Local wood and fine crafts | 49 | 16 | €250,000 | EMS, PNR des Vosges du Nord |
| Total | 14 ed. | 693 | 282 | €4,003,000 |
02
Who funds the scheme
Main funder
The Eurometropolis of Strasbourg has funded the main budget since the first edition, under its current name as well as under its former name of Urban Community.
14 editions funded without interruption since 2012
€4,003,000 in grants paid to winners
Partners
Usually around the theme of the year, by extending the area covered or by funding special prizes.
- 2012Iconoval
The Alsace image cluster supports the first edition alongside the CUS.
- 2014-2015DIRECCTE
A €10,000 special prize for the Open Data edition, then support for the following edition.
- 2017-2021Metz, Nancy
Five editions open to the Lorraine metropolitan areas: smart mobility, green economy, space data.
- 2018-2020Mulhouse Alsace Agglomération
Three editions extended to southern Alsace, alongside Metz and Nancy.
- 2021CNES, Booster RhineSpace
The “Space data” edition, set up with the French space agency and the regional booster.
- 2022-2024Karlsruhe
Three cross-border editions. EM Strasbourg joins in 2024 on artificial intelligence.
- 2025PNR des Vosges du Nord
Three special Local Wood prizes of €4,500 each, i.e. €13,500, and an area that becomes eligible.
The 2026 edition, devoted to water, is under way: 15 winners, with the Northern Vosges Regional Nature Park, ENGEES and the Aquanova cluster.
03
How the scheme was evaluated
Four successive studies were carried out by BETA (Bureau d’économie théorique et appliquée, University of Strasbourg / University of Lorraine / CNRS / AgroParisTech-INRAE), a laboratory specialising in the evaluation of public programmes supporting research and innovation. The latest, delivered in November 2025, was carried out by Laurent Bach, Zoé Kleinpeter, Patrick Llerena and Chimène Nuicer, under the direction of Laurent Bach.
- 107direct interviews, from 45 minutes to 3 hours
- 35additional responses via an online questionnaire
- 150projects covered, i.e. 85 to 90% of the funding paid
Four studies, twelve editions evaluated
The first study, in 2016, covered the 2012 to 2015 editions. The second, in 2018, the 2016 edition. The third, in 2019, on the 2017 edition, has remained unpublished until now. The fourth, delivered in 2025, evaluates the 2022 and 2023 editions, revisits a representative sample of the 2018 to 2021 editions and incorporates earlier results. It makes it possible to compare two periods, 2012 to 2016 and 2017 to 2023.
The BETA method, adapted to the creative industries
The approach is based on microeconomic surveys conducted directly with the people involved in the projects. It first measures the economic effects, turnover and jobs, then the learning: scientific and technical skills, visibility and sales skills, organisation and management, collaboration networks, strategic positioning and business model. It systematically distinguishes direct effects, which match the project’s objectives, from indirect effects, which go beyond them.
The online questionnaire also serves as the framework for the interviews. It was revised for the 2025 study without breaking comparability with data from earlier studies.
What a standard evaluation measures
Turnover and jobs directly linked to the funded project.
What BETA measured as well
- Skills development
- Visibility and image
- Lasting networks and partnerships
- Strategic changes of direction
- Renewal of the community
Scope
- Only projects supported by the Eurometropolis are covered. Those funded by the other partners are excluded.
- Projects under the specific Open Data funding are not counted.
- Unsuccessful applicants were not surveyed, for lack of resources.
Sample
- 189 participations, by 136 different winners, i.e. a third of the total population.
- 150 projects covered, representing €2.06M of funding paid.
- Satisfactory representativeness by size, sector and legal status, weaker for the 2018 to 2021 editions.
Reading the figures with caution. Respondents were always asked for a minimum estimate. All the economic values on this page are therefore based on the lowest assumptions: the real orders of magnitude are higher.
04
Economic impact
of turnover generated by beneficiaries over 2012 to 2023, under the lowest assumption. Extrapolations put the figure between €6.3M and €9.5M.
Compared with the funding paid, the ratio ranges from 2.65 under the lowest assumption to 4.75 under the highest. BETA takes around 3 euros of turnover for every euro of public money as the realistic assumption. One project in two generates turnover and, as is often the case, the benefits are concentrated in a small number of high-impact projects. No clear link appears between the amount of funding received and the turnover generated.
The scheme steps in at the very start of a project’s story, when funding is hardest to find. For 30 to 37% of winners, the project simply would not have existed without it. For almost all the others, it would have remained much more limited.
Even some projects that were discontinued ended up producing benefits, thanks to the skills acquired and the relationships built along the way.
05
Impact on jobs
full-time equivalent jobs created or maintained, in around a third of projects
One job for around 16,700 euros of funding. These jobs are counted beyond the funding period, which makes them an indicator of genuine consolidation of activity and not merely of a windfall effect.
Job creation is statistically linked to turnover generation. Very small organisations, with 1 to 5 employees, account for most of the effect on jobs; those with more than 10 employees, for most of the effect on turnover.
06
Skills and access to markets
What winners take away from the experience goes well beyond the immediate financial result. At the end of the project, they report:
Increasingly varied outputs
In the early days of the scheme, projects were mostly digital. Today they are split between physical outputs (37%), mixed outputs (33%) and digital outputs (22%), with cultural and artistic projects still present. Nearly two thirds of completed projects lead to a new or improved product or service.
07
Partnerships: the most distinctive effect
This is the scheme’s raison d’être: getting players who did not know each other to work together. For more than a third of winners, the collaboration is a first.
- 75%
of collaborations between co-winners continue after the funded project, over the 2017 to 2023 period. Two thirds do, even when the partners did not know each other at all.
- 57%
of winners continue working with a new partner over 2017 to 2023, compared with 50% over 2012 to 2016. This is the core of the structuring effect.
- 90
local service providers at least were brought in by the projects over the recent period, during and after the funding.
These effects go beyond the projects themselves. Winners also mention taking part in accro events, a better knowledge of the local business fabric and a greater ability to make contacts.
08
A community that keeps renewing itself
In each call for projects, 84% of winners had never won before. The scheme does not benefit a closed circle: between 2012 and 2025, 544 different entities, project leads and partners combined, took part in at least one project. BETA, for its part, counts 417 different winners between 2012 and 2024, a pool that has been growing by around 6% a year since 2020.
Cumulative number of different project leads and partners who took part in at least one project. Source: Tango&Scan database (accro), 2012 to 2025.
Winners describe Tango&Scan as a “project enabler”, a “catalyst”, a “booster” that takes them from idea to reality. They find it simple, accessible and not elitist.
Alongside the measurable effects, the studies point to a host of very real nano-effects: start-ups launched, micro-businesses saved, unlikely encounters. Almost all winners say they are ready to apply again.
09
What changed between the two periods
Comparing the two periods evaluated, 2012 to 2016 and then 2017 to 2023, shows how the scheme has evolved.
Leverage effect
€2.80€2.97of turnover for every €1 invested
Cost per job
€28k€13.5kof funding per job
New partnerships
50%57%of winners with a new partner
Values for 2012 to 2016, then 2017 to 2023.
What is getting stronger
- Economic efficiency, with a better return per euro invested and a sharply lower cost per job.
- The intensity of technical learning and strategic changes of direction.
- Partnerships between players and sectors that did not know each other.
What calls for attention
- Greater professionalisation which, according to some winners, may make selection tougher at the expense of more cultural or artistic projects.
- A weaker effect on encounters outside the projects, beyond the funded partnerships.
- Awareness that is still limited in the art and crafts communities.
The scheme has reached maturity. Its economic effectiveness is confirmed, and the challenge is shifting towards preserving its diversity and broadening its reach.
10
Five ways to go further
They emerge from the consolidated results and from beneficiaries’ feedback, and aim to strengthen the scheme without losing what sets it apart.
Securing long-term funding
With a return of around 3 euros for every euro invested, the scheme warrants multi-year budget visibility.
Preserving the diversity of projects
Keeping the balance between projects with strong economic potential and those with a cultural or social dimension, by recognising forms of value other than turnover.
Broadening its reach
Reaching out to communities still little involved, art schools and crafts in particular, and calling on former winners as ambassadors.
Bringing the community to life
Relaunching a directory of winners and offering coaching and mentoring, to extend the network effect beyond the funded projects.
Continuing the evaluation
Following cohorts over time to document long-term effects and fine-tune how the scheme is steered.
Sources and method
Study of the impacts of the Tango&Scan scheme, BETA (Bureau d’économie théorique et appliquée, University of Strasbourg / University of Lorraine / CNRS / AgroParisTech-INRAE). 2025 study, 2022-23 editions, final report v.1, November 2025, by Laurent Bach, Zoé Kleinpeter, Patrick Llerena and Chimène Nuicer, under the direction of Laurent Bach, with the support of Madeleine Hubert and Léo Bissey (accro). Previous studies: 2016 (2012 to 2015 editions), 2018 (2016 edition) and 2019 (2017 edition, unpublished). Activity and funding data: the scheme’s database (accro, 2012 to 2026).
The economic estimates were made on a deliberately conservative basis. The real orders of magnitude are higher.
← Back to Tango&Scan