Viadrina impresses with 6th place in the start-up radar - successful founders in focus!

Viadrina impresses with 6th place in the start-up radar - successful founders in focus!

On March 8, 2025, it was announced that the European University Viadrina Frankfurt (Oder) had taken 6th place among 63 smaller universities in the Stifterverband's founding radar. This ranking, which was published on March 3, 2025, evaluates universities based on their start-up support. The Viadrina is highlighted particularly positively in three areas: the importance of start-ups at the university, raising awareness among relatives about the topic of starting a business and general start-up activity.

Viadrina is one of the top universities in Germany in five of seven evaluation modules. Anja Rillcke, an employee of the Viadrina start-up center, emphasizes the lasting effect of start-up support. The start-up center supports students, graduates and academic staff in implementing their business ideas. The support includes numerous measures, including discussions about the business idea, professional qualifications and individual coaching from lawyers as well as tax and business consultants.

Successful start-ups and projects

In recent years, numerous people have taken advantage of the incubator's offerings. These include successful start-ups such as the training platform for hunter training, the Jägerschmiede, the smart business card company called Conntect as well as several projects in the creative industries such as LAVA ArtCafé, Kukuryku! and the Gerstenberg Cultural Manufactory. The team behind KARA-Limo, which developed a sustainable soft drink, was also supported.

Current start-up projects include the labor market integration of refugees and digital master's examination preparation. The start-up radar, which has been created since 2012, aims to improve start-up support at universities. A total of 191 universities took part in the latest edition.

Progress in start-up support

Loud archiv.europa-uni.de Viadrina was already successful in the start-up radar when it took second place among 71 universities in 2021. The success here is attributed, among other things, to a wide range of offerings, individual support and creative students. In 2020, 683 people benefited from the incubator's offerings. In addition, 26 Viadrina members qualified for a funding program, and 14 of them founded a company this year.

Dr. Ramona Alt, the head of the start-up center, was pleased with the placement and pointed out that Viadrina has taken part in the competition four times since 2011, always finishing in the top three. Viadrina President Prof. Dr. Julia von Blumenthal emphasizes the role of the university as a source of inspiration for new ideas and business models. Brandenburg's Science Minister Manja Schüle congratulated on social media.

The context: EXIST program

An important context for start-up support at Viadrina is the EXIST program, which was launched 25 years ago in 1997. The program aims to promote technology-oriented and knowledge-based spin-offs from German universities. It has made a significant contribution to establishing a start-up culture at universities and supported numerous start-ups. The first EXIST competition was launched at the end of the 1990s by the then Federal Ministry of Education, Science, Research and Technology (BMBWFT), with over 200 universities submitting their ideas.

The various phases of the program up to the most recent approach of starting the “EXIST-Women” program in autumn 2023 show a continuous adaptation process to the needs of the start-up scene. The measures to support women in founding companies and the promotion of AI start-ups during the pandemic illustrate how flexible and targeted the EXIST program works. Loud sce.de EXIST's support is seen as crucial to the success of many start-ups, which reinforces the importance of Viadrina in this context.