EIT, spurring entrepreneurship and innovation all over Europe.
The EIT (European Institute of Innovation and Technology) is an EU-based R&D institution headquartered in Budapest, Hungary, aiming at spurring entrepreneurship and innovation all over Europe.
The EIT has cooperated a number of higher educational institutions, R&D labs and leading firms in order to help accelerate the development of innovation, start up new projects and businesses and encourage a new generation of entrepreneurs in Europe.
There are different sectors such as EIT Climate-KIC, EIT Digital, EIT Food, EIT Health, EIT InnoEnergy and EIT Raw Materials. In each category, different institutions, firms
EIT projects in Sweden
Photo: EIT Empowering Women Entrepreneurs in Health Innovation – Design Thinking Workshop
In Sweden, some universities such as Karolinska Institutet, Uppsala University and
Last year, I attended EIT Health Innovation Day (innovation-creating event) in Uppsala as a design thinking coach. So today, I would like to share how it looked like and what happened during the event.
EIT Health
EIT Health is a consortium of more than 50 core partners and 90 associate partners aiming at improving the quality of life of European citizens and the sustainability of healthcare systems in Europe.
They have considered the promotion of healthy living, supporting active aging, the improvement of healthcare to be crucial issues, and, have tackled them.
EIT Health Innovation Day
On November 18, 2016, EIT Health and Uppsala University invited Uppsala University students and local people as supporters to enhance entrepreneurial and innovational spirits.
Their main aim was to create solutions to real needs & cases received from private and public actors by working on health challenges across faculty and program boundaries.
“The overall goal of the EIT Health Innovation day is part of a long-term strategy to increase the interaction between academic education and the public sector and industry. To stimulate early engagement in health-related issues – regardless study subjects – participating students will enhance their awareness of needs for global development. Public and private partners are also invited to participate and interact by presenting health-related needs, coaching and future work experience opportunities.”
EIT Health Innovation Day used the Design Thinking methodology in order for a day of inspiration, networking and interdisciplinary problem-solving. The attendances followed the Design Thinking process.
- Empathize
- Define
- Ideate
- Prototype
- Test
Sponsored Link
Challenges
The attendances worked on four different challenges.
Challenge A
・How can teens be motivated to break their soda habit?
Your challenge today is to use a Design thinking inspired approach to first understand what motivates teenagers to change a behavior and then use this knowledge to come up with one idea that can be used by teens to break a soda habit?
Challenge B
・How might senior citizen’s opportunities increase for quality time together with people they like to hang out with?
Your challenge today is to use a Design thinking inspired approach to first understand how and what the challenges are for elderly to meet people they like. Your task will then be to use this knowledge to come up with one solution aimed to increase their opportunity to meet.
Challenge C
・How can a forum be created to increase the chances of getting a job interview if you live with a disability?
Your challenge today is to use a design thinking inspired approach to first understand how a person living with a physical disability can create new networks and then use this knowledge to come up with one idea that can be used to make a new forum where people with different abilities can get personal tips about possible jobs for them to apply for.
Challenge D
・How can immigrant’s opportunities increase to find people they like to hang out with that knows the Swedish culture?
Your challenge today is to use a design thinking inspired approach to first understand what are the opportunities and challenges for an immigrant to make new friends that know the Swedish culture. Your task will then be to use this knowledge to come up with one idea enabling immigrants to make friends that they like to hang out with and that can introduce them to the Swedish culture.
The Innovation Day was facilitated by DriveHuset people. Each category chose a winner based on their final pitch. Then, winners proceeded their ideas with a local self-government.
I was very honored to help one of the teams and they became a winner for Challenge B. Every team worked so hard to find a solution within several hours. Not only did I enjoy the event, but I was also impressed by their efforts.
Interestingly enough, a majority of solutions that the attendances pitched was creating a digital-platform in order to connect people to organizations or institutions, but all of them were unique ideas.
This year, EIT Health Innovation will be happening on December 1 (Fri), 2017. You can register here! Don’t miss it!!
Sponsored Link
