University of Cologne secures funding for “Excellence Startup Center.NRW“

The University (UoC) can now expect up to 30 million euros in funding over the next five years. In addition to the UoC, five other universities were successful in the competition. Innovative new businesses strengthen the city’s attractiveness – also as a destination for meetings and events.

With its GATEWAY Startup Service, the University of Cologne is already pursuing the goal of significantly increasing the number of its startups and spin-offs, and at the same time increasing their professional diversity. Among other things, the focus of the new center will be on life sciences and digital education, but also on the research priorities of the Clusters of Excellence. Another goal is to create a university-wide culture of entrepreneurship as well as awareness among students, scholars and scientists for data science and entrepreneurship – and to equip them with the necessary skills. Last but not least, the communication of activities and successes in the field of transfer and startups will be improved – both internally and externally. The additional funding allows the university to enhance the project’s services.

“Excellence Startup Center.NRW”

The Ministry of Economics, Innovation, Digitalization and Energy of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia had called on all state universities to apply for funding in the competition. With up to 150 million euro, the government supports six universities for five years to enhance the quantity and quality of innovative and growth-generating academic business spin-offs. Accelerator and incubation programs for founders receive the funding to promote transfer from science to business. The Excellence Startup Centers form a network with the regional economy, technology centers and digital hubs in order to further strengthen the environment for business development.

13,000 employees at work: Cologne and its surroundings are one of the hot spots when it comes to business creations in Germany. The 650 digital start-ups in the city generate approx. 1 billion euros in revenue per year. Further information on key events, such as the pirate summit can be found in our event calendar.

In our interview with Till Ohrmann, the initiator of the pirate summit talks about the local startup environment and the City of Cologne.