To help build stronger regional innovation ecosystems and foster the next generation of entrepreneurs, all universities from the Transform4Europe alliance have joined forces in the T-RISE (Transforming Regional Innovation Ecosystems for Sustainable and Digitally Enabled Entrepreneurship), a new project funded under the EIT Higher Education Initiative. Over the next two years, the partners will work together to strengthen innovation capacity, promote entrepreneurship, and deepen collaboration between higher education institutions, businesses, and regional stakeholders across Europe, placing university-based entrepreneurship at the heart of Europe’s innovation and competitiveness agenda.
T-RISE is one of 35 projects selected for funding under the EIT Higher Education Initiative, following a highly competitive call that attracted 138 applications from across Europe. The EIT HEI is the only European instrument solely focused on boosting the innovation and entrepreneurial capacity of higher education institutions, empowering them to become the innovation leaders of tomorrow.
When universities, research organisations, businesses and society work together, innovative ideas can be transformed into real-world solutions. This is the ambition behind the project T-RISE (Transforming Regional Innovation Ecosystems for Sustainable and Digitally Enabled Entrepreneurship). The project is coordinated by the University of Alicante (Spain) and brings together six beneficiary universities from the Transform4Europe alliance: Jean Monnet University Saint-Étienne (France), the University of Primorska (Slovenia), Vytautas Magnus University (Lithuania), the Catholic University of Portugal, and the University of Silesia (Poland). The consortium also includes META Group (Italy) and Alicante Science Park (Spain) as beneficiart partners while the remaining T4EU universities, Saarland University (Germany), University of Trieste (Italy), Mariupol State University (Ukraine), Estonian Academy of Arts (Estonia) and Sofia University "St. Kliment Ohridski" (Bulgaria) together with Vizzuality (Spain) participate as associated partners.
University of Primorska (Centre for Development and Knowledge Transfer, Faculty of Management) will lead work package 7 on communication and dissemination, coordinating activities that will promote the project's results, engage stakeholders, and support the long-term impact and visibility of T-RISE.
Together, the partners will strengthen regional innovation ecosystems by fostering sustainable and digitally enabled entrepreneurship and reinforcing collaboration between higher education institutions, businesses, research organisations, and regional stakeholders.
A central outcome of T-RISE will be the establishment of a Joint Innovation Office (JIO) for the Transform4Europe alliance, providing coordinated support for innovation, entrepreneurship and knowledge transfer across partner institutions. The project will also develop a portfolio of innovative micro-credentials for students, researchers, and staff alongside new incubation, acceleration and mentoring programmes designed to support the creation and growth of start-ups and spin-offs.
Focusing on sustainability, green transition, and digital transformation, T-RISE will equip participants with the knwoledge, skills and support needed to translate research into market-ready innovations. The project will also strengthen long-term cooperation with the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT) ecosystem, working closely with EIT Climate-KIC, EIT RawMaterials and 28DIGITAL, to create new opportunities for students, researchers, entrepreneurs and innovators to participate in European innovation and entrepreneurship initiatives.
By combining the expertise, experience and regional networks of universities, innovation organisations and industry partners, T-RISE marks an important step towards creating more connected, resilient, and innovation-driven regional ecosystems across Europe. The project reinforces the Transform4Europe Alliance's shared ambition to educate knowledge entrepreneurs, foster innovation with societal impact, and strengthen the role of European universities as drivers of sustainable development, competitiveness and regional transformation.
