ACE director Erik Boer helps select most innovative change-maker.

On October 4th, ACE director Erik Boer was an expert jury member during the 10th anniversary of the EIT Awards in the EIT CHANGE category. The EIT Entrepreneurship Awards are an annual event, promoting innovation and encouraging entrepreneurs by putting the most innovative ventures, entrepreneurial graduates, innovation teams and women from the EIT community in the spotlight. The EIT Awards are awarded in four categories: the EIT CHANGE Award, the Innovators Award, the Venture Award and the Woman Award.

The EIT CHANGE Award

The EIT CHANGE Award recognizes top graduates from EIT education programs throughout Europe. The winner receives €20.000. Supported by EIT InnoEnergy, this year’s winner is Simone Accornero, CEO and co-founder of FlexiDAO (Barcelona, Spain). The company creates a software that automates energy data processing and exchanges, while combining traceability and transparency for the first time.

Simone says: “Before joining EIT InnoEnergy, I had never even thought of becoming an entrepreneur. EIT InnoEnergy showed me how my work and research as an engineer has a real impact on the surrounding environment”.

The EIT Label

The EIT is a unique European innovation initiative whose educational mission is to raise a new generation of entrepreneurs and innovators in Europe with an entrepreneurial mind-set. MA and PhD programs are eligible to apply for the EIT Label, revolving around six different ‘Knowledge and Innovation Communities’. At ACE, we hosted a group of the MSc Energy for Smart Cities for an entrepreneurship training earlier this year!

As a university incubator we are always looking for the most innovative startups to create disruptive waves in the market so we are happy and honored to be a part of the EIT Entrepreneurship Awards and the EIT community, which inspires us to keep moving our support of high-tech and science-based startups to a higher level.

European Institute of Innovation and Technology (website).