Finalist

Young Entrepreneurial University of the Year Award

St. Pölten University of Applied Sciences

Finalist of the Young Entrepreneurial University of the Year Award

St. Pölten University of Applied Sciences - Austria

"We contribute to society as an engaged and entrepreneurial university!"


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@eudres_alliance
(E³UDRES²)
@fhstp
(St. Pölten UAS)
#digitalmakershub
(Digital Makers Hub)

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Summary

St. Pölten University of Applied Sciences (STPUAS) acts as an engaged Platform for Collaborative Innovation (https://youtu.be/OFWdSsdf2E4). Since this idea was outlined by two faculty members at the UIIN-conference and was adopted as an important objective in the university's strategy in 2017, work has been going on intensively and successfully to implement it. As a coordinator of a European University Alliance (www.eudres.eu), St. Pölten UAS is an inspirational source of knowledge transfer and the acquisition of skills for all people who care about contributing to an inclusive and progressive society.
STPUAS supports individual learning experiences, promotes innovation and entrepreneurship and in particular contributes to smart and sustainable regions. With only about 3700 students and 367 full time staff member, STPUAS acts as best practice for a small, regionally anchored, but internationally networked engaged and entrepreneurial university (https://www.fhstp.ac.at/de/uber-uns/qualitaet/daten-und-fakten).
STPUAS has succesfully co-initiated manifold activities to support students, staff and innovation ecosystems on regional, national and European levels, such as E³UDRES², the Engaged and Entrepreneurial European University as Driver for European Smart and Sustainable Regions (www.eudres.eu), the E³UDRES² Entrepreneurship and Innovation Network E.I.N.S. (www.eudres.eu/eins), the ILab (http://ilab.fhstp.ac.at), SMARTUP (www.stp-smartup.at), the Digital Makers Hub (www.digitalmakershub.at), the Digital Innovation Hub East (www.dih-ost.at), the DIH.work (https://dih.work/), the Open Innovation Association N’Cyan (www.ncyan.at) and collaborates with various stakholders across the knowledge square.
In addition, STPUAS amongst the leading institutions for applied R&I in Austria, works continuously on various collaborative and contract research for/with business and public administration and is characterized in particular by its interdisciplinary approach (http://research.fhstp.ac.at).

Key People


FH-Prof. Dipl.-Ing. Hannes Raffaseder
Chief Research and Innovation Officer
Management Board,  STPUAS



Mag. Gabriele Permoser
Head of Service Unit Research and Knowledge Transfer
Service Unit Research and Knowledge Transfer,  STPUAS



Mag. Ulrike Wieländer
Section Head Young talent, innovation and start ups
Service Unit Research and Knowledge Transfer,  STPUAS



Petra Fischer, BA MA
Project Coordination
Service Unit Research and Knowledge Transfer,  STPUAS



Mag. Irene Auffret
Knowledge and Technology Transfer
Service Unit Research and Knowledge Transfer,  STPUAS



FH-Hon.Prof. Ing. Peiman Zamani
Technology Transfer and Innovation Development
Service Unit Research and Knowledge Transfer,  STPUAS



FH-Prof. DI Dr. Franz Fidler
Department Head
Department Media and Digital Business,  STPUAS


Acknowledgements

We acknowledge a wide range of supporters, sponsors, collaborators and partnering organisations and networks like the European Union, the European Institute for Innovation and Technology, our partner universities of the our European University Alliance E³UDRES², the University Industry Interaction Network, the Federal Ministry of the Republic of Austria for Education, Science and Research, the Austrian Research Promotion Agency, the Austrian Wirtschaftsservice, the Austrian Science Fund, the Region of Lower Austria, ecoplus – the business agency of Lower Austria, tecnet equity, accent, the City of St. Pölten, Industry meets Makers, Femal Founders, Austrian Angel Investors Network, Austrian Startups, Net4Future, Tabakfabrik Linz, N’Cyan – Innovation für Menschen, many other stakeholders across the knowledge square on regional, national, European and global levels including global ventures as well as regional SMEs and start-ups, NGOs, schools and training centers, science centers and museums, co-working spaces and innovation hubs, accelerators and incubators, science and business parks, research labs and other higher education institutions, regional and federal governments, interest and pressure groups, funding agencies and others and above all the many smart, motivated, talented people including pupils, students and alumni, lecturers, scientists and developers, artists, practioniers and industry experts, business angels and investors, decision makers and responsible citizens that make our learning journey happen.

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IMPACT STORY

Impacting lifes

In short, STPUAS story is that of a regionally anchored village club that made it into the European Champions League within a couple of years. Only a few years ago STPUAS was only of regional importance as good Austrian average, but currently it is the only UAS all over Europe to coordinate both a European University Alliance and a pilot project of the EIT HEI initiative.
Since the main ideas of the paper "Towards a Platform for Collaborative Innovation: A roadmap for a small University of Applied Sciences” were included in t strategy in 2017, STPUAS has undergone an enormous development. It has quickly become one of the best networked universities in Austria and has set future guiding examples for interdisciplinarity, support of women in ICT (https://www.fhstp.ac.at/de/onepager/coding-is-female) and creativity (https://www.digitalmakershub.at/apart/, https://www.fhstp.ac.at/de/studium-weiterbildung/medien-digitale-technologien/creative-computing).
STPUAS is particularly successful in the cooperation with SMEs in the digital transformationand contributes to three of six digital innovation hubs nationwide.
With the Creative Pre-Incubator and the SMARTUP initiative, several successful start-ups (e.g. https://www.circly.at/, https://quickspeech.at/) have been supported and the (regional) innovation ecosystem has been enhanced. These efforts were confirmed by the Austrian Spin-Off Initiative, which recognized STPUAS as a leading institution in the UAS-category (https://www.spin-off-austria.at/de/dashboard#facts-figures).
So far, the success story reached its peak with the initiation and implementation of E³UDRES² and E.I.N.S. Both initiatives strengthen efforts to further develop as an entrepreneurial university, empower innovation ecosystems and support the transformation of small and medium-sized cities and their rural surroundings into smart and sustainable regions.

LEARNINGS

Lessons learned

Key to success is to act as a platform for collaborative open innovation to manage relationships with a wide variety of diverse stakeholders across the knowledge square and enable interaction between them, to promote the use of purposive inflows and outflows of knowledge to accelerate internal innovation and to expand the markets for external use of innovation rather than considering students and their future employers as customers, and degrees and publications as products. It is important to encourage interdisciplinary collaboration (e.g. http://cdhsi.fhstp.ac.at), promote applied research (https://research.fhstp.ac.at/en), offer a wide range of opportunities for cooperations with companies (https://research.fhstp.ac.at/en/transfer-innovation/offer-for-companies), facilitate open innovation and knowledge transfer in a broad sense (https://research.fhstp.ac.at/en/transfer-innovation), support innovative education (https://skill.fhstp.ac.at/); encourage faculty innovation (https://www.fhstp.ac.at/de/mediathek/pdfs/infoblaetter/action-plan-hrs4r-de-pdf.pdf), promote student entrepreneurship with a strategic concept like “7 steps to startup” (https://research.fhstp.ac.at/en/transfer-innovation/start-up-and-entrepreneurship), enhance open innovation platforms and associations (https://www.digitalmakershub.at/).
The most important learned lessons can be summed up as follows: empower smart individuals rather than enforcing performance through to narrow defined objectives and indicators; enable collaboration across the boundaries of departments as well as across generations, disciplines and branches; establish a diverse set interaction with the industry ranging from informal meetings to strategic long-term partnerships; act along the institutions’ own strategy instead of reacting to every upcoming trend; learn from the best institutions and have a close eye on ideas to be developed off the beaten tracks outside or on the brink of common academic ecosystems, study and maybe adopt their structures and concepts, but don’t try to copy them.

FUTURE PLANS

What's coming?

STUPAS evaluated its strategy and presented a new version in early 2022 (https://www.fhstp.ac.at/de/newsroom/dossiers/vision-und-strategie-2025#!/en/) following its vision: As a European University, we are an inspirational source of knowledge transfer and the acquisition of skills for all people who care about contributing to an inclusive and progressive society. According to its mission statement, STPUAS focuses on people and takes its social responsibility seriously, supports individual learning experiences, promotes innovation and entrepreneurship and contributes to smart and sustainable (European) regions. The strategy highlights six main strategic orientations: (1) We create added value for society, (2) We promote student centered teaching and learning, (3) We strengthen staff members and teams, (4) We expand our research, (5) We recognise and use our market opportunities and (6) We are a European University.
Most important for future development is the European University E³UDRES and its E&I Network E.I.N.S., enhancing a stakeholder centred approach that promotes interrelated task and platform-oriented interactions rather than focussing on more specific aspects and single actions. Thus, collaborative and agile methods, like human-centred design, co-ideation, co-creation, business model canvas, lean start-up or design thinking are adapted to the specific needs. The overall methodology builds on maturity spirals that start with small, manageable, easily calculable, prototypical tasks. Future objectives include the support of “Ent-Re-Novators” (Educators, Researchers, Innovators, Entrepreneurs), joint European degrees, joint microcredentials empowering re- and upskilling, a joint European (Pre-)Incubator and the implementation of a future-guiding academic I-culture with the “I” standing for innovative, interdisciplinary, inclusive, international, inspiring,…

KEY STATISTICS

500+

Projects by students from all study programs and in particular from courses like the award winning ILab (https://ilab.fhstp.ac.at/), the European Project Semester (http://www.europeanprojectsemester.eu/), the E³UDRES² I-Living Labs (https://www.eudres.eu/

300+

Cooperative research projects and contracted research with/for partners from business, industry, NGOs, public administration and/or engaged citizens have been implemented since 2018

60+

Inspiring Chats (https://www.digitalmakershub.at/inspiring-chats/), co-learning events with various stakeholders as well as similar networking, community and knowledge sharing events have been (co-)hosted since 2018

50+

Students in 23 teams with start-up ideas and founding intentions have been selected by an independent jury and have been consulted, trained and supported with free access to co-working space, infrastructure, scientific expertise and networks in the specia

10+

Hackathons, Bootcamps, OI-Challenges and similar open innovation events to co-ideate and co-create challenge-based solutions have been supported and co-hosted together with stakeholders from (regional) innovation ecosystems across the knowledge square (ht

Triple E Awards

The Triple E Awards are a global recognition of efforts toward the quest for entrepreneurship and engagement in higher education. It is the first award to focus specifically on different dimensions of the universities' third mission. Implemented regionally, the Triple E Awards aim to foster change in universities and to emphasize their role in their communities and ecosystems.

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