Off the top of my head

One of my responsibilities at EIT Digital Helsinki is our Co-location Centre (CLC) at Open Innovation House on the Aalto University Campus in Otaniemi. EIT Digital has CLCs in nine different countries across Europe (Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Netherlands, UK, Spain, and Sweden) and their mission is to foster open innovation by bringing together students, business people and researchers.

In Finland, we are fortunate to be located on the Aalto campus, which makes it easy for the EIT Digital Master Students to find their way to our office. We are co-located with Helsinki Institute for Information Technology HIIT in the second floor of the Open Innovation House, which ensures a continuous presence of top-notch scholars in our premises. In order to attract business people to our center, we have developed a residency program for startups.

Through this program, we have hosted some 40 startups since the fall 2012. We select early-stage startups operating in the areas of EIT Digital’s action lines (Cyber-Physical Systems; Future Cloud; Future Networking Solutions; Health and Wellbeing; Privacy, Security and Trust; Smart Energy Systems, Smart Spaces ; and Urban Life & Mobility). We also value their connections to our partner network and require an international ambition. The companies are welcome to stay approximately 6 months in our premises free of charge and we offer them a table, access to Internet and meeting rooms, free coffee and good company. All the startups, work in the open office area of our CLC in order to maximize the interaction with student, researchers and other entrepreneurs. We also invite them to give a Friday afternoon “Lunch Talk” where the audience consists of employees of the companies of the local ecosystem, of university faculty, and of students. We endorse student internships in these young companies and when possible try to facilitate their cooperation with big corporations.

Although this sort of open innovation environment is not for everyone, most of the companies have appreciated the offer. Oftentimes, the startups find synergies with each other; they share experiences and contacts and learn from each other. For our students they act as role models. The entrepreneurs come from different background: some startups are student-driven, some are research-based and some are founded by a serial entrepreneur. It is the people working in these companies with their varying backgrounds, experiences and personalities that create a unique atmosphere to our CLC.

Please find below a list of companies that we have hosted in the program so far. In my upcoming posts, I will be introducing some of them.

2012: Innorange, Quuppa, Hitseed

2013: Koru Lab, Framgo, Polqu, Sharetribe, Netmedi, Health Puzzle/5th Corner, Screen.io, Ell-I, Healser

2014: QuattroFolia, Memory Trails, CyberLightning, Eyes3, GIM, Innovamo, 720 degrees, Nimble Devices, Demophon, Seneqo, Check My Level, Venture Bonsai, Neliapila Nordic Health Compass, Seed Consulting, Health SPA

2015: Funzilife, Noticed, Light Cognitive, Solu, RD Partners, Enterlot, Lukoton, Verkkolakimies, Space Make, Vertical, …