The goal is clear: start-ups in Europe should catch up with those in America and China. To this end, the local culture of innovation is to be strengthened. To this end, the Munich-based start-up company UnternehmerTUM has now joined forces with 20 other business incubators from 14 European countries to form the "Rise Europe" network.

Ilka Kopplin

Business correspondent in Munich.

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A good 20 participants, including those from the University of Oxford and ETH Zurich, recently came together at Schloss Elmau for a seminar lasting several days at the invitation of the UnternehmerTUM start-up center, which is closely linked to the Technical University of Munich and the state capital. Many of the start-up incubators from Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, Great Britain, Estonia, Finland, France, Ireland, Italy, Austria, Portugal, Sweden, Switzerland and Spain already knew each other, but had not yet worked across the board. Thanks to the alliance, the exchange should now go faster.

Potential not yet exhausted

"There are already great examples of start-ups that have become market leaders in Europe," said Helmut Schönenberger, founder and CEO of UnternehmerTUM, in an interview with the F.A.Z. He mentions the German bus and train travel provider Flix Mobility, the battery manufacturer Northvolt and the computer computing specialist IQM. In the future, however, these should no longer be isolated cases. "We have the potential to multiply that number, but we haven't exhausted it yet," he said.

The participating business incubators already have more than 2000,7 start-ups that raised almost <> billion euros in funding last year. From the point of view of Schönenberger and his team, these young companies represent a significant economic potential that needs to be supported. With Rise Europe, Europe now has a "new pacesetter," said Schönenberger. According to the initiators, their aim is not to get funding, but rather to increase the visibility of Europe's start-ups and create a better environment for them.

Promote market entry in other European countries

In the future, for example, it will be easier for young founders to enter the market in other European countries and grow faster. The idea is also to network female founders in particular, after all, there is a lack of them everywhere. In addition, the centers want to learn more from each other in the training for founders. In addition, the exchange of skilled workers is to be promoted, and access to capital and customers is to be improved. In the future, the partners want to create an annual overview of the most important of their start-ups and then provide them with special support.

The UnternehmerTUM start-up center, which is backed by BMW heiress Susanne Klatten, started in 2002 with just two employees, and now employs around 400. In the meantime, around 550 companies have emerged from it, partly because an ecosystem of science, family businesses, corporations and young founders has developed in and around Munich over the past two decades.