Strengthening the Entrepreneurial Spirit

Work at the Centre for Entrepreneurship into Action, or ZENTRIA for short, will begin on 1 January 2024. A Lower Franconian hub where innovation, business start-ups and knowledge transfer will now be promoted even more strongly. ZENTRIA is organised by a university alliance consisting of Julius-Maximilians-Universität Würzburg (JMU), Technische Hochschule Würzburg-Schweinfurt (THWS) and Technische Hochschule Aschaffenburg (TH AB). In addition, intensive and expanded cooperation is planned with the regional start-up and technology transfer centres (ZDI, IGZ, TGZ) as well as other partners from the regional and national economy.

Start-up State Bavaria

In the university regions of Swabia, Middle Franconia, Upper Franconia, Lower Franconia and Eastern Bavaria, the Free State of Bavaria is supporting the establishment and expansion of high-performance start-up hubs as part of the "Hightech Transfer Bayern" initiative. With a wide range of offers from new degree programmes to financial support, Bavaria is strengthening the ecosystem of start-up training in the five university regions in the long term.

As part of this initiative, JMU represents the Lower Franconian university region together with THWS and TH AB. At the centre of this start-up hub will be a certificate programme that guarantees a particularly practical entrepreneurship education. The programme is divided into four phases. In addition to attending established courses, these include a workshop analysing megatrends, gaining a comprehensive understanding of the entire product development process and applying the acquired knowledge to real challenges faced by cooperating start-ups and small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).

A special highlight is the final practical phase, which can be completed either through a stay abroad at partner institutions or through an internship at a cooperating start-up. Analyses of megatrends, courses, internships, stays abroad and the transfer of acquired knowledge to real-life challenges make for a well-thought-out certificate programme.

Favourable Conditions for Promising Start-ups

"We are delighted about the opportunity for in-depth cooperation in the field of entrepreneurship with the network partners and start-up centres. The potential of the ZENTRIA.hub as a joint Lower Franconian start-up hub is enormous and will benefit both university members who are keen to set up their own businesses and the scientific community, the start-up culture at JMU and the region of Franconia," says Matthias Bode, Vice President for Innovation and Knowledge Transfer at JMU.

"In view of JMU's excellent performance in the renowned THE Ranking in the area of knowledge transfer and research quality, we are proud to continue to provide optimal conditions for the ZENTRIA.Hub," continues Bode.

"With our start-up-savvy students and employees at the two university locations in Würzburg and Schweinfurt and the five additional THWS technology transfer centres in Mainfranken, THWS is already a start-up hotspot in the region. We are therefore happy to contribute our expertise to the ZENTRIA.hub in order to significantly increase the existing potential for scalable companies in the network. In order to achieve this, we are planning new modules at THWS to further expand the offer for the certificate programme and in the start-up sector in general in the long term," says Dr Christian Lengl, Head of the Applied Research Campus at THWS.

"The opening of the ZENTRIA.hub is an important milestone in our comprehensive support programme for founders. The hub intensifies the activities of TH Aschaffenburg in practical knowledge and technology transfer and underlines our consistent commitment to a vibrant start-up ecosystem in the Bavarian Lower Main region," says Prof. Dr Klaus Zindler, Vice President Research and Transfer at TH AB. "Together with our partners, we look forward to continuing to shape the Lower Franconian innovation landscape and to writing the success stories of the next generation of entrepreneurs."

"A varied study programme for entrepreneurship qualification"

The University of Würzburg is in charge of the new degree programme, which is coordinated by the Service Centre for Research and Technology Transfer (SFT). "With the ZENTRIA.Hub, we now have the opportunity to offer our students from all three universities a compact and varied study programme for entrepreneurship qualification and to anchor it sustainably. In addition, we promote mutual networking between students from different disciplines, which is essential for finding supporters and team members for the realisation of start-up ideas," says Tanja Golly, start-up consultant. "The involvement of start-up personalities and regional start-ups in the study programme creates an important link to entrepreneurial practice, which is important and valuable for the recognition of innovations and technology transfer," adds Iris Zwirner-Baier, Head of the SFT.

Over a period of five years, "Hightech Transfer Bayern" is funding the ZENTRIA.Hub with around 500,000 euros and two permanent positions. Students and academic staff from all disciplines can apply to join the programme from autumn 2024. The first pilot run will take place in the summer semester 2025 and winter semester 2025/26.

Contact

Prof. Dr Matthias Bode, Vice President for Innovation and Knowledge Transfer, University of Würzburg, e-mail: vp-innovation@uni-wuerzburg.de

Service Centre for Research and Technology Transfer (SFT), University of Würzburg, e-mail: sft@uni-wuerzburg.de