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His background

After having finished a Bachelor of Science in Civil Engineering and a Master's degree in Marketing/Management in Budapest, Gáspár graduated in 2016 from Central European University where he got an MBA.

Today, he is a cofounder and managing director of Miutcank.

His work at Miutcank

Gáspár is one of the two co-founder of Miutcank. He works on the business plans of Miutcank and constantly tries to create new collaborations, especially with the municipalities. He also works with the developers in order to improve the app.

Through its activity, Miucank aims to improve the well-being of citizens (via social links) by building trust and revitalizing the neighbourhood and to reduce the purchase of material goods/services (via exchanges between neighbours). We can say that Miutcank's mission, the desired performance, is to bring back social wellbeing in the neighbourhoods.

We did not identify the importance of intangible resources within the company, except perhaps Gáspár and the team's motivation and vision. Instead, we will focus on the intangible resources created by Miutcank's activity.

First of all, Gaspard told us about the evolution of confidence with the municipalities, which are their sources of income. Over time, confidence is built up and it becomes easier to make municipalities understand the benefits of the service Miutcank offers, even if it's still complicated to reform the municipality processes and to collaborate with them.

Finally, many intangible resources are created within the neighbourhoods through the use of the application. People can exchange skills and knowledge among themselves. This allows to build confidence between the people. Moreover, the application allows people to recreate social links between them, which has an impact on their well-being and helps to develop it. Miutcank is a kind of "hub" of immaterial resources exchanges.

Some externalities have been identified : 

• Reduced purchase of new products/services through exchange between neighbours. People therefore no longer need to have their own tools for example. This allows less consumption of new products and so less impacts on the environment.

• At the same time, the sharing economy allows the development of social links between people in the same neighbourhood, which contributes to the dynamism of the neighbourhood and has a positive impact on the happiness/mental health of citizens. The exchange of goods and services between people helps to recreate confidence between them and can create new relationships.

The positive externalities of Miutcank's activities are still difficult to measure at the moment. The question stays the same: how to measure the feeling of connectivity, safety, happiness, confidence or health? This is a question Miutcank is thinking about. The answer could show the municipalities the real positive impacts of Miutcank in the neighbourhood.

Thanks to the application, Miutcank can collect interesting data about the inhabitants of each neighbourhood (competencies, tools, opinions, ...). This data forms the basis for exchanges between Miutcank and its various partners.

The main actors interested in Miutcank's work are obviously the municipalities of the different districts of Budapest and later other cities. For them, Miutcank is a trusted intermediary that allows them to get the feedback of the citizens on some projects. Let's take a real and topical example: the Chain Bridge of Budapest. 

The Chain Bridge is the most famous bridge in Budapest. It is currently being rebuilt and therefore closed to cars. It has been found that the citizens are getting used to this situation, as the bridge is normally overcrowded. If it were closed to cars, the passage of public transports and bicycles would be much more efficient. Miutcank therefore organised a survey to gather the opinions of more than 2,000 citizens on the future of the bridge. The results showed that 67% of them were in favour of limiting the use of the bridge to public transport and soft means of transport such as bicycles. 49% of them who use a car on a daily basis were also in favour.

Another collaboration opportunity that Gáspár told us was to work with real estate agencies. The idea was not only to provide data about the size, equipment, ... of the flats but also about the quality of life of the neighbourhood.

Miutcank also wants to maintain good relations with its own users by asking them about their needs through the application. For example, the company organised, few years ago, an interview with 40 users to gather opinions and ideas of improvement. Users are part of the development of the application.

• Difficulties in making municipalities understand in concrete terms all the positive impacts that Miutcank's activity has on the neighbourhood. The work with the municipalities can therefore be a bit long because it is necessary to prove to them (beside of doing a lot of paperwork) why it is in their interest to work with Miutcank.

• The company aims to enhance the quality of its services by expending its staff (actual lack of resources), fostering greater opportunities for meaningful exchanges among people within the neighbourhood. 

Miutcank is a very interesting company which, through its application, allows users to share things rather than purchase. It is an application that facilitates the return to common sense: sharing tools, knowledge, time or simply creating neighbourhood events.

It is a company that acts on a rather local scale. The company's desire is twofold: to be able to recreate social links in a given territory and to reduce the purchase of material goods. This territorial performance is not easy to achieve. For the time being, the contractualisation mode set up by Miutcank, in particular with the municipalities, does not yet encourage the company to move towards this performance and maintain it over time. Longer-term contracts with the municipality would perhaps allow Miutcank to develop its activity more serenely.

Miutcank totally matches with the scissor effect, as defined in FCE: they allow the reduction of material resources (via the sharing of goods between neighbours) and the development of intangible resources (via these exchanges and the creation of social links). Miutcank helps to develop trust between people, the exchange of skills or knowledge, the informal relationships and thus promotes the well-being of citizens in the neighbourhood.

The externalities of Miutcank are therefore twofold. Firstly on the environment, by reducing the impact on it through the sharing of goods and services. Secondly on local society by recreating links and revitalizing neighbourhoods. For the moment, it is difficult for Miutcank to measure these positive externalities. This is why municipalities still have difficulty in seeing the concrete benefits on their territory. 

Finally, we realised the central role that cooperation between the company and the municipalities represents. Miutcank places itself as a trusted intermediary between the municipality and the citizens. As data is what can be most valuable for Miutcank, we think that many other actors could benefit from the company's activity.

We would like to make it clear here that there is no question of negative criticism of this project. The aim is to imagine a fictional story about he development of a similar company through the FCE concepts. It is also a way to inspire people in a concrete way.

We are in 2030, Miutcank has continued its efforts. These efforts have become more productive, more relevant and more visible to more and more local actors thanks to the framework provided by the FCE...

Today, a large proportion of Budapest's citizens are aware of the impact of their ways of consumption. Objects, knowledge and skills are used much more efficiently when they are shared. Miutcank's role has therefore become more important on the territory .

Miutcank and a number of local players (local farmers, local craftsmen, etc.) who share the same values have been experimenting cooperations for many years. The success of these collaborations has led to the development of trust over the years. This trust is one of the pilars that allows them to maintain a sustainable cooperative ecosystem. Local players use the application to diffuse their activities and events. Finally, a sustainable way to advertise!

Miutcank has also become the privileged intermediary between the municipality and the citizens of Budapest. As well as using the app to gather the opinions of citizens in various districts about minor issues, Miutcank, with municipal representatives, organises round tables about more important subjects. For example, in 2027, the municipality thought about reorganising the Buda district to make it car-free. Miutcank, which has a relationship of trust with the residents of the Buda district, was asked to include them in the discussions.

These kind of projects provide Miutcank with one-off income from the municipality. To sustain its development and continue to add value, Miutcank has worked on demonstrating the social and environmental benefits of its activity. On the environmental side, the data collected via the application shows how many people have chosen to use shared items rather than buy new ones. On the social front, Miutcank can track changes in neighbourhood dynamics. Thanks to annual surveys and questionnaires, they can get insights about the well-being of local residents (more and better quality social links). 

These benefits are now visible to a range of local players who are helping to develop Miutcank's activity:

• The municipality whose aim is to take care of its citizens. It includes Miutcank in its annual budget.

• The citizens themselves who benefit from Miutcank's services and are invited to make a donation to keep the business going.

• Local players who benefit from the Miutcank community thanks to the advertising they diffuse via the application.

• Some real-estate agencies who see the improvement in the quality of life in the neighbourhoods through the data that Miutcank provides. The "well-being in the neighbourhood" is becoming a new criterion for residents.

French similar initiatives 

• Share&Smile: a company that tries to develop the cooperation and the sharing economy through their activity.