Collaborate to Innovate - how can universities and companies jointly unleash potential

As Creators Expedition Team we are involved in various educational projects. We are involved in the two entrepreneurship trainings TACC - Training for Automotive Companies Creation with University UniMoRe Modena and TECC - Training on Entrepreneurship & Company Creation with FH JOANNEUM and we are currently working with our project partners on the EU-funded project Corship, in which we all aim to improve Europe-wide cooperation between start-ups, companies and universities.

Times like the ones we are currently experiencing pose new challenges for both companies and the education sector. In these fast-moving times, it is essential to react flexibly to new developments. Just as companies react to new circumstances, educational institutions must constantly adapt and create new learning concepts and content to equip students with the right skills.

As the current circumstances force us to deal with new social and economic challenges, the exchange between the education sector and companies will become even more important in order to find innovative solutions. We think that this and the rise of a global knowledge economy forces companies to go beyond the traditional funding of research projects and think about different formats of collaboration with the education sector.

To get a better insight we asked some of our ecosystem partners, how they see the importance of new educational concepts in this area.

We talked with

• Marta Pellegrino, the Program Coordinator of TACC – Training for Automotive Company Creation at the Unimore Univeristy in Modena, Italy
• Nino Gross, Director of Communication at Fifteen Seconds
• Ligia Pasquale, Lecturer and Program Coordinator of TECC – Training for Entrepreneurial Company Creation at FH Joanneum in Graz, Austria

What do you think about collaboration and how do you see it between companies and universities?

Marta: Collaboration between universities, companies as well as startups is central to promoting and spreading the culture of innovation, especially when we talk about high-tech innovation.

Ligia: I see the collaboration between universities and companies as an enormous chance for all involved to grow. It allows a closer access to the talents and R&D and the possibility to look beyond your own building corners. Such collaborative relationships can be nurtured via technology transfer, bringing output from research to the market and open innovation, where academic teams and companies or start-ups jointly develop solutions to complex social, economic and environmental society is facing. Of course, the format of such collaboration will depend on the goals and wishes both sides pursue.

I particularly find fascinating the collaboration between Bill and Melinda Gates foundation, their enterprises (like Microsoft) and universities around the world, to tackle many different challenges aiming to benefit all sides of the equation, and overall, the society. And we don’t need to go so far to testify the power of such collaborative relationship. For instance, here in Graz, great synergies can be found among Fachhochschules, Universities and big renowned companies like AVL (TECC program is one example), as well as with startups and science park.

Nino, please tell us how do you deal with university collaboration at Fifteen Seconds?

Over the last years, we were glad to see so many Austrian universities joining us at the Fifteen Seconds Festival as part of our talent program to combine the best of both worlds: Motivated young people looking to apply their theoretical knowledge in a real-world environment and leading innovative companies looking for talent with new ideas and fresh perspectives.

Marta, what is the most important factor for cooperation to work?

The most important factor is to create synergies and understand, especially for universities and companies, that if the action is single and without an overview, the results obtained in terms of innovation and business creation will be partial. I think the contribution of institutions such as municipalities, regional governments etc. is also very important to propose a common course of action.

Talking about innovation, how do you see the importance of collaboration in times of Corona?

Ligia: When I think of the current situation we are having worldwide - without lessening in anyway the tragic effect of seeing so many human lives taken - I see a great opportunity for innovation. When people are put into new challenges - and we are in one of the biggest challenges humanity has faced in decades – they start looking inside themselves. We connect with the inner part of ourselves that drive us forward; we connect with our creativity and ability to solve problems. And the first stage of the innovation path is exactly empathizing with the problem to only then, develop ideas to solve it.

We have experienced that with the “stay at home measures” the value of collaboration has increased. Nations are helping each other on understanding the problem and on finding joint solutions. Knowledge has been put open to access, researchers and companies from different industries are opening up their preliminary discoveries and technologies for others to advanced further and faster, aiming at a greater benefit. The power of the collaboration is enormous in my opinion, even more when it is put together strategically and towards a common goal.

Marta: I agree, these days collaboration plays a fundamental role in trying to defeat the virus, defend the weakest people, propose useful solutions that people who are on the front line can adopt. For example, we have witnessed the problem of the lack of safety and medical health devices, to which individuals and companies have responded with real solutions, sometimes even developed in times of emergency.

Do you think that the current situation will change our understanding of educational formats?

Nino: It certainly gave online lecturing a big push and showed how many units could be held in virtual classrooms.

Ligia: It is already happening, we see schools and universities closed from more than one month with lectures done online. But I would not say that we are using very new educational formats, as the online education has started more than 30 years ago (of course, evolving since then). For me, the main “Corona-effect” is that now everyone have to try it. Like you or not, students, teachers, parents, governments, we all had to accept the situation and try ways of teaching and learning online. This might result in a bigger change in how we see the conventional and current educational formats and how we should evolve from now on.

If we look at the latest data from the changes in digital habits due to the lockdown (The economist, Is China winning?, Apr.16,2020), work and education online has the greatest rates of growth when it comes to internet content consumed. We have already seen in previous years the boom of MOOCs, SPOCs, microcredits, online learning platforms, and executive education online. There is no way to keep things as it was before, so a change has started in educational formats, and it also started a change in working formats too.

Nino, how can we enrich the entrepreneurial ecosystem through collaboration with students/universities?

"Done right, collaborations with universities are a win-win. It's very important for the growth of students to apply their knowledge in the real world as soon as possible. On the other side, it's crucial for innovative companies to be in close contact with tomorrow's visionaries."

What do you think is an important step towards building a corporate ecosystem?

Marta: This is not a step, but I think that dialogue and the common goal of creating a single (and not many) entrepreneurial ecosystem on a territory is central. Too often every actor refers only to his own reality and in this way energies and investments are dispersed. I really believe that as we adopt regulatory plans for the development of cities, we should adopt "innovation plans" that involve all the actors we have mentioned, with the institutions in the role of moderators.