At KIT, the funding program is implemented by the Innovation Management Service Unit (IMA) and the Project Management Agency Karlsruhe within KIT (PTKA). The funding program “Young Innovators” addresses young scientists who have founded a start-up based on their business idea or prepare for doing so. Applicants should have left a university or research institution not more than one year ago and submit a detailed business plan in addition to their innovative idea.
According to the principle of innovation taking place when the right conceptions, the right people, and the right ideas come together, it is focused on bringing together ideas of young innovators, public funds, and private investments like pieces of a puzzle.
“Apart from the systematic networking of the actors, major attention is put on the funding of entrepreneurial thinking and acting as the decisive prerequisite for innovation,” says Dr.-Ing. Jens Fahrenberg, Head of the KIT Innovation Management Service Unit. In this way, start-ups at KIT, from the idea to design to funding, will gain importance. For KIT, coordination of this program means the strengthening of the innovation pillar in the knowledge triangle (research – teaching- innovation).
Activities among others are aimed at supporting young innovators in the acquisition of funds from federal programs, the Helmholtz Association, or from state programs. The legal structure of KIT as a university of the state of Baden-Württemberg and national research center of the Helmholtz Association is advantageous, as it has access to and insight into a variety of funding scenarios of Germany and the federal states, which can be evaluated and used individually for a specific spin-off.
Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) is a public corporation and state institution of Baden-Württemberg. It fulfills the mission of a university and the mission of a national research center of the Helmholtz Association. KIT pursues its tasks in the knowledge triangle of research, teaching, and innovation.