Open innovation

For many of the grand challenges facing our society and economy, an open innovation approach spanning disciplines and industries is necessary for the development of solutions with real impact. Open Innovation refers to the opening up of the innovation process of organizations and thus the strategic use of external actors in order to exploit the innovation potential to an even greater extent. The co-creation process, the joint development process of several persons or stakeholders is a central part of open innovation. The UZH Innovation Hub has set a strategic goal to create opportunities for researchers and students to engage in open innovation programs, to learn the methods and contribute to new solutions with their unique perspectives.

The UZH Innovathon and the Wholesome living project are two initiatives within the Innovation Hub that aims to create new ideas at the interface of research and practice. While both formats are centered around student creativity and a guided innovation process, the uniqueness and relevance is set by the real-world perspective and challenges brought in by the partners. The Innovathon is a short course format centered around a hackathon in which students develop creative solutions to digitalization challenges proposed by partners. In the Wholesome living project students work over 10 months in a co-creation process with partners and researchers to develop innovative solutions to broad challenges.

Wholesome Living project

The wholesome living project is based on an interactive partnership with practice partners. The 2022-2023 project focuses on managing and exploring life-long data around physical and mental health, personal finances and retirement planning. Over the course of 10 months, students from the University of Zurich, and the IAD Interaction Design (ZHdK) are working in teams in a co-creation process centered around a rethinking of growing old. The students are guided through an innovation process and have regular touchpoints with both UZH researchers, coaches and representatives from the partner companies. Each team will create an actionable solution to help people achieve their long-term goals and live happier, healthier lives.

“The Digitalization has a lot of potential to really improve different aspects of mobility. But to really transform the digital technologies into new services or products a lot of challenges need to be tackled. This is where we think and hope that the innovathon contributes!” Anja Schulze, Prof for Innovation and Technology Management, UZH

“It is really important for us to be part of the UZH Wholesome Living Project. We need different views and especially when it comes to pension planning, financial planning, and long-term planning we realize ever more that it is actually the perspective of young people we need.”

Jackie Bauer, Economist, UBS, Partner Wholesome living projet 2022-2023

“AXA lives Open Innovation and develops solutions in partnership in various areas. This is also the case with the UZH Innovation Hub. We are interested in access to the most diverse ways of thinking and the interdisciplinary approach.”

Daniel Temperli, AXA, Partner Wholesome living projet 2022-2023

“What the teams managed to do in such a short time and how they presented it, well based on figures, well thought through and brave innovative ideas. That was really amazing!”

Christof Hauser, Consumer & Customer Insights Manager, IKEA, Partner Innovathon 2022

“With the Innovathon we have managed to create a unique course here at the university of Zurich, where we bring together the contributors for innovation We have the researchers with their knowhow in their field, the challenge partners who know very well about how these challenges manifest in their organizations and the students that bring in the creativity!” Eva Maria Håkanson, Deputy Head Innovation, UZH

Innovathon

During the UZH Innovathon Master and PhD students take a deep dive into relevant digitalization challenges and develop innovative concepts facilitated by a hackathon-style idea development phase. Partners from industry, governmental organizations, private research institutes and NGOs provide insights on how the challenges manifest in their organizations. The UZH Innovathon was launched in 2021 in a collaboration between the UZH Innovation Hub and researchers from the Digital Society Initiative Community Mobility. In fall 2022, students developed solutions within the topics “Digitalization of Mobility” and “Building a human-oriented future of Work”. www.digitalinnovation.uzh.ch/innovathon

Videos https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wsrZixkNeRk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IWS7A8NV35Y&t=27s