POWER

EXIST - Startup culture - Concept phase

Project duration: 03/2019 - 08/2019
funded by the BMWi

Hannover Medical School (MHH) is planning to submit a concept focusing on (1) Raising potential - supporting universities that have not yet made a name for themselves in the startup sector in expanding their startup activities. The MHH is an excellent fit for the EXIST program lines Raising potentials, as there is great potential based on a research-strong institution and a continuous number of invention disclosures and this potential has not yet been sufficiently raised. The Raising Potentials program line puts us in a position to change this for the first time. As part of the project, successful measures from established startup universities are to be transferred to the MHH. This will be done by benchmarking and mentoring two successful startup centers. On the other hand, in close cooperation with the target groups of potential startup support at the MHH, new needs-based formats for the further development of transfer, the establishment of a startup culture and target group-specific business models for potential spin-offs will be developed.

The concept phase is divided into six work packages, which comprehensively prepare the project phase.

The long-term goal is to permanently establish a startup culture at the MHH and to sustainably develop supporting structures and measures in order to raise the potential of clinical research and increase the number of spin-offs using this potential.

EXIST - Potentials

Project duration: 10/2020 - 09/2024
1.98 million funded by the BMWi

The EXIST-Potentials funding guideline of the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy was created to leverage previously untapped potential for knowledge-based spin-offs, to develop excellent locations into international beacons of startup support and to sustainably expand the regional anchoring and profile building of universities. 220 universities and colleges applied for funding for their projects - Hannover Medical School (MHH) was able to prevail among 141 applicants with its project POWER - Revealing Potential & Successfully Realizing Growth. The funding amounts to almost two million euros. Federal Economics Minister Altmaier personally announced the funded projects at a ceremony in Berlin. The universities will receive a total of 150 million euros in funding over the next four years, with the project starting in spring 2020.

"We are delighted to have the support of the Federal Ministry of Economics. The aim of POWER is to bring good ideas from science to the market by establishing support structures.  This includes strengthening entrepreneurial thinking and action, as well as establishing a positive start-up spirit at the MHH and sustainably qualifying the university as a startup university in the coming years," emphasizes Christiane Bock von Wülfingen, Head of the newly founded Staff Unit for Research - Knowledge - Translation - Transfer (FWT2). "To do this, we need efficient processes that ultimately lead to the implementation of viable business ideas."

The Ministry of Science and Culture of Lower Saxony has already been convinced by the project and will cover the ten percent share of the EXIST project POWER.

"Startups are of great strategic importance for Germany as a business location: they drive innovation and create the jobs of the future, being the engine of structural change. Universities play a decisive role as think tanks for innovative startup projects. This is why the BMWi is supporting universities that have submitted convincing project proposals for the sustainable expansion of their startup activities with the EXIST-Potentials funding competition," said Federal Minister of Economics Peter Altmaier.

Source: MHH press release, Dec. 2019