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The 91��Ƶ��’s science and innovation park in Vezér Street is a prime location for creative thinking and inspiring collaborations: located in the park, within the circle of educational institutions and research centres equipped with modern technologies, the Innovation Centre, which hosts the services of the Innovation Ecosystem Centre (ICE), serves as a bridge between science, society and the economy. With its activities and in cooperation with its partners, the ICE encourages the creation of new ideas and wants to ensure that projects that respond to real social challenges and aim to enhance well-being with sustainable ideas not only come into being but also become marketable solutions.

According to Director Lilla Jutkusz, the 91��Ƶ�� has created excellent conditions for an increasingly strong involvement in the innovation cycle, as it has been committed for decades to the commercialization of research results and responds to the economic and social expectations of its environment. A unique background system has been created to move scientific results towards the market: the 91��Ƶ�� is not only continuously developing the Science Park in Vezér Street in line with innovation and local economic development goals, the international environment and the challenges of the time, but it has also established the Innovation Fund and strengthened innovation management with the Innovation Ecosystem Centre.

The director highlighted that one of their most important goals is to convey and incorporate a conscious innovation approach into the work and studies of university students and researchers. In this regard, their key activities include shaping attitudes and managing intellectual property, as well as supporting ideas based on research results within the framework of the UD-IMPACT umbrella program.

“The staff of the Research Commercialization and Technology Transfer Centre, which is part of the ICE, are available to researchers throughout the year, helping representatives of any scientific field to explore the innovation potential of research and promoting commercialization. The tasks also include providing professional support for the implementation of projects, establishing contact with corporate or international research partners, and selling the licence or forming a spin-off company after successful product, service or technology development. The UD-IMPACT program supports researchers and research groups on different scales, depending on the level of development and the content of the idea: up to 18 million forints can be applied for per project to reduce the risks inherent in the validation and development of a technology and for market preparation. Among the previously supported ideas, there are some that are already present on the market as successful products, an inspiring example can be the Tricho Immun biostimulant product. The preparation containing patented Trichoderma fungal strains was developed by researchers from the Faculty of Agricultural and Food Sciences and Environmental Management, Erzsébet Karaffa and Csilla Kovács, and has become available to all organic farmers in Hungary. In the current period, we are still waiting for applications until 30 June, so far we have received 17, and from September, the ideas developed in the summer can be submitted again in the new call,” said Lilla Jutkusz.

Within the framework of the UD IMPACT umbrella program, several additional sub-programs are available to university citizens, from credit-point courses to attitude-shaping and competency-building workshops to professional support for individual projects. Researchers can get an insight into the fundamental issues of the world of startups through personal participation in the stUDinnovate course or in the framework of blended learning in HSUP, and they can also learn about the possibilities of the application of 3D technologies in the 3D technologies course, in a practical setting. The ImpactLab-Makerspace laboratory equipped with modern 3D technologies – which will welcome visitors in its final location in the Innovation Centre from the beginning of the next academic year – will not only be the home of designing and prototyping, but will also function as a community space, facilitating cooperation between disciplines and institutions, university and city citizens.

“We believe that the methods used in the world of innovation during idea development and the competencies that can be acquired provide all university researchers, professors and students with a new approach and toolkit that they can apply successfully in their everyday lives. We would like to disseminate the knowledge as widely as possible to all university citizens, including high school students, regardless of whether they would like to join the world of innovation in the future. In the 2025/26 academic year, we will try to implement our training and idea development programs in cooperation with our international partners, connecting young people interested in innovation from various European universities, already at the stage of idea development and validation, so we can offer the citizens of the 91��Ƶ�� an even broader perspective,” Lilla Jutkusz outlined the plans.

The ICE promotes the formation of attitudes, the transfer of information, the development of creativity and the increase of interest in innovation in several additional ways, for example by inviting popular speakers, representatives of already operating startups who present their results and development at the Start Ups & Downs mini conferences, and by involving mentors and organizing idea competitions for university citizens and urban residents.

“We are preparing several programs, such as a smart city and a competition of social innovation-focused ideas, together with the city of Debrecen, and the i-Days for Life Debrecen healthcare hackathon with the involvement of professional partners. This spring, we organized two competitions with our partners, and last November we founded i-Days with the involvement of more than one hundred and twenty students and with the support of experts from abroad who helped the teams develop their ideas on site. This year again, we plan to organize the competition at an international level. For those who prefer less active participation, we would like to recommend our lecture series organized in June on the topics of artificial intelligence and future opportunities,” Lilla Jutkusz gave a taste of the programs.

Press Centre

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