Innovative business models of Design Thinking students have a chance to succeed in practice
14.09.2023
The innovative ideas of the students of the Slovak University of Agriculture in Nitra (SUA), which emerged from the Design Thinking incubation program, have a chance to succeed in practice. A series of workshops in the coworking center of the university was organized by the SUA Creative Center.
The program was covered by the Innovation Platform for the Bioeconomy, which is managed by Danka Moravčíková, coordinator of partnerships at the Creative Center. The three-month incubation program was intended for students who have innovative ideas with the potential to succeed as business models. A total of 22 students from different faculties formed six teams. Under the guidance of the lecturer, the well-known service designer Adam Brocka, they prepared presentations of business models, which were judged and evaluated by an expert jury made up of representatives of SUA and business practice. "We have collected very interesting ideas, which we would like to publish in the form of a brochure. Several small business plans could be implemented at our university or outside it, for example through the Nitra Community Foundation, which supports such projects with grants. At the same time, project authors have the opportunity to use consulting services within the Creative Center, and their business ideas will be given room for further development," said the project manager of the SUA Creative Center, Barbora Čakovská.
The condition for the ideas was that they had a social benefit and were easy to implement. The winning Vitruvian project is aimed at educating young people with the aim of effectively informing them about a healthy lifestyle, prevention and a balanced diet. The project called UniSlow is an effort to connect the business and academic environment. Other students would like to raise awareness about food waste through social media, workshops and events. Their idea was called No food waste. The other SUA projects Connect, Povegetuj and Nelenivci were also related to sustainable, so-called green business.
The two best teams won a three-day stay and a ticket to the Fifteen seconds festival in the Austrian city of Graz. This unique European event for around 10,000 people from all over the world featured 200 top international speakers and 150 innovative exhibitors. Among them were representatives of the Slovak University of Agriculture in Nitra and its Creative Center, specifically the advertising department. Thanks to the cooperation of the Innovation Platform for Bioeconomy, which is also part of the Creative Center and the Center for Bioeconomy at BOKU University (Universität für Bodenkultur) in Vienna, SUA in Nitra was the official academic partner of this event for the first time. "This cooperation follows on from previous joint projects and activities carried out in the field of bioeconomy and technology transfer and will continue with already prepared project intentions, one of which is, for example, the creation of the so-called Bioeconomy Start-up village in the Nitra region," said Danka Moravčíková. "Students who, in addition to their studies, are interested in entrepreneurship and have good ideas, saw at the festival that entrepreneurship can really be done in various fields. It doesn't have to be limited to what they study, but it can be connected very easily," added B. Čakovská.
