Gdańsk University of Technology coordinates EIT-funded DIGIMPACT.EU project | Gdańsk University of Technology

EIT is an integral part of the third pillar of Horizon Europe, i.e. Innovative Europe. With 3 billion EUR budget, EIT works to strengthen sustainable innovation ecosystems across Europe, support EU universities in integrating more entrepreneurial education, bring new solutions to global societal challenges to the market, etc. The DIGIMPACT.EU grant was awarded as part of the EIT’s Higher Education Institutions (HEI) Initiative which works to strengthen the entrepreneurial and innovation capacity of HEIs at the institutional level and strengthen integration into innovation ecosystems. The fourth EIT HEI call received 130 applications from 55 countries comprising 1480 organizations, and selected 47 applications for funding, including DIGIMPACT.EU.

The project aims at enhancing the capacity of HEIs for digital innovation and entrepreneurship, i.e. for using digital transformation to address significant social challenges and generate high social impact in the process. To this end the project will:

1. Build digital innovation and entrepreneurship capacity within HEIs through relevant courses and mentorship offered to trainers, administrators and students, and through tools and services to support to the digital innovation lifecycle, from ideas and products to businesses and impact, e.g. support ideation, prototyping, business planning, etc.
2. Build partnerships between HEIs and public administrations, businesses and social enterprises, and foster institutional change and generate high social impact through such partnerships. The impact areas will include: digital migration, emergency response, sustainable agriculture, and urban mobility.
3. Empower HEIs to become local and regional innovation ecosystem hubs, integrating digital capabilities into education, research, and business acceleration, fostering entrepreneurial activity to create start-ups and scale-ups, and empowering them with digital capabilities to help address relevant societal challenges.

The project consortium comprises four HEIs: Gdańsk University of Technology (Poland), Universidad de Granada (Spain), University for Continuing Education Krems (Austria) and University of the Aegean (Greece),  and Crowdpolicy – a pioneering open innovation company from Greece. The consortium is coordinated by the Gdańsk University of Technology’s Department of Informatics in Management. The project coordinator is Tomasz Janowski, Head of Department of Informatics in Management. Internal collaboration includes Department of Entrepreneurship and Department of Management and locally, the project collaborates with Gdańsk-Gdynia-Sopot Metropolitan Area, Gdańsk Public Transport Authority and others.