Transforming industry challenges into collaborative research projects
The Integrative Think Tank (ITT) is a five-day challenge workshop that brings together young researchers from Master’s to Postdoc level and industry representatives to translate real-world challenges into scientific research questions. The member universities take turns in organizing the event and invite local companies or government organizations to contribute challenges they face in their operations. The participants and supervising lecturers work in mixed groups with the company representatives, analyze the state-of-the-art in theory and methods, and explore further avenues of research. The groups derive concrete outlines for potential research projects and present them to the company representatives. The companies, supervisors, and students team up to pursue the research projects, e.g., as co-supervised Master’s theses between the university and the company.
Universities: all 4EU+ universities participate in the ITT project
Lead university: Heidelberg University
Target audience
Advanced Master’s students
PhD students & young researchers
Professors
Industry and government representatives
Previous editions
2022: Heidelberg University, in collaboration with SAP and Volume Graphics
2023: University of Geneva, in collaboration with the canton Geneva
2025: Heidelberg University, in collaboration with INOVA+ and SAP
2026: Sorbonne University, tba
Contact: Michael Winckler, Heidelberg University, michael.winckler@iwr.uni-heidelberg.de