Seminars and workshops, an innovation exhibition, a panel discussion and an evening keynote: The program highlights of the Innovation Day NEULAND attracted about 750 visitors to KIT South Campus. Throughout the day, there were numerous seminars with different thematic focuses, e.g. information and artificial intelligence or climate and environment, as well as an exhibition of KIT researcher and founder teams to discover. During the Guided Tour, a tour through the exhibition, there was the possibility to get to know all teams. More information on the exhibitors can be found here.

"The multi-faceted program makes Innovation Day a unique event," said Professor Thomas Hirth, KIT Vice President for Innovation and International Affairs, at the official opening together with Dr. Max Fabian Riedel, representative of Carl Zeiss AG.

At the award ceremony of NEULAND Innovation Competition, things got exciting: First place in the ideas category went to Hannes Wilhelm Weinmann from the Institute of Production Technology (wbk) for his idea "Novel, automated process for continuous stack formation optimizes production for lithium-ion battery cells". Prof. Bastian Rapp, Dorothea Helmer, Ph.D. and Frederik Kotz, Ph.D. from the Institute of Microstructure Technology (IMT) were honored in the transfer category for their project "Glassomer - processing glass like a plastic" in collaboration with Glassomer GmbH. An overview of all award winners of the Innovation Competition can be found here.

Shaping the future with innovations: Expectations and contributions from industry and science" was the topic of the panel discussion. Here, Jan-Henning Fabian (ABB Group), Ph.D., Andreas Kämpfe (Witzenmann GmbH), Ph.D., Prof. Ingrid Ott (KIT) and Prof. Thomas Hirth (KIT) gave their views to the audience. Among other things, the importance of Germany as a science and business location was discussed in comparison to other European countries and the rest of the world.

After lunch, five young KIT start-ups proved themselves at the founder pitch. Aura, auvisus, Cepri, heat_it (Kamedi) and RoomPriceGenie had four minutes to present their business ideas. The pitches were evaluated by an expert jury consisting of Alexander Fauck (Technologiefabrik Karlsruhe), Andreas Sütterlin (beratergruppe:Leistungen PartGmbB), Alin Semenescu (Sparkasse Karlsruhe), Marlon Malter (First Momentum Ventures), Maurice Kügler (Hightech-Gründerfonds), Ph.D. and Marcel Vogler (Freigeist Capital). When the winners were announced, heat_it was pleased to take first place. The audience also chose winners: Cepri and heat_it were equally convincing, which is why both teams were presented with the audience award - congratulations!

The official conclusion of the event was the keynote by Wieland Holfelder, Ph.D., Vice President Engineering and Head of the Google Development Center in Munich. He first gave an introduction to the topics of machine learning and artificial intelligence and then presented exciting projects from Google. "The development and use of artificial intelligence is currently still in its infancy. However, AI has real opportunities to become big in all industries if enough access is generated," Holfelder said. After his presentation, Holfelder fielded questions from the audience.

After the keynote, attendees wrapped up the evening with snacks and musical accompaniment while networking in an open atmosphere.