Welcome to Business Development Friesland.

At BDF, we bring together business, education and government to achieve more. We accelerate growth, open doors to international opportunities and stimulate innovation with social impact. From economic progress to sustainable development – we are the engine behind a strong, future-proof region.

BDF for business

Do you have a great idea for a new business or trying to expand to other markets? We’ve got you covered!

BDF for education

Young people are the future, and it is up to us to provide them with best education as possible. BDF is taking on many projects that try to do just that. Interested?

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BDF for government

Partnering up with governments in order to develop, optimise and execute policy measures is one of the abilities we pride ourselves for. Take a look on how we do it!

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BDF

In 2002, Lennard Drogendijk started a new company: Business Development Friesland. This has since grown into an international project management agency with a team of 6 employees. BDF helps people and organizations from the region grow. Company, school or government, BDF can support you in realizing economic, international or social ambitions.

In 2010, a new branch followed, namely the Inqubator Leeuwarden foundation, which was set up with the support of the province of Friesland, the municipality of Leeuwarden, two colleges and two schools for vocational education. This is the place for (student) startups to develop their own company, but also a hotspot in Friesland for MBO and HBO/WO students, start-ups and professionals to learn, train or simply for support at the start-up, entrepreneurial skills in the broadest sense of the word.

BDF is involved in the most important education and business programs in the region and has carefully built its network to become what we are today: specialist in education and business support in the province of Friesland and beyond.

In June 2024, Rinze Bos became the new director of BDF and Inqubator, giving Lennard Drogendijk more time for the international networkorganisation Enterprise European Network.

Location full of potential

Leeuwarden is the capital of the Dutch province of Friesland. It is a compact city with 108,000 inhabitants, surrounded by beautiful varied scenery and the starting and finishing line for the world famous “Eleven cities” ice-skating tour. Leeuwarden was also the European Capital of Culture in 2018.

The Frisian capital has a historic center, numerous national monuments, a range of delicious and surprising shops and inviting terraces. The city is one of the modern paradoxes: a city that respects its past and at the same time looks to the future by investing in research, development and IT. A city in the countryside, where students, families and elderly residents feel at home and where companies find the space they need to grow and develop.

A highlight of the projects we do

Fashion.ED Education

Fashion.ED focuses on the fashion industry which is considered the second largest polluter in the world. To promote

UnicornQuest Government

In 2021, Europe witnessed the birth of 85 "Unicorns", new technology companies worth $1 billion or more. Unfortunately,

CE4RT Business

What is CE4RT? The CE4RT project is a trans-national collaborative project supporting a network of tourism SMEs

LEADER Scale-Up Education

After the success of LEADER a few years ago, it became clear that there are many more possibilities

Growth game Education

How much do you believe that intelligence is fixed? Growth Game aims to make young people believe in the Growth Mindset

DIGITOUR Business

The destinations of traditional tourism countries are hives of SMEs which produce tourism services ranging from

ITs4Women Business

Did you know women are only for 20% represented as it comes to founding companies? And only 15,6% of the (Dutch) people

Plastic Value Business

In PlasticValue we want to prepare current and future professionals, in particular those in innovation, production or

Entrust Business

ENTRUST is a training & development programme where people aged 50+ will be supported