AU takes significant steps to boost research-based innovation

Innovation and entrepreneurship must be core activities at Danish universities. 

This trend has already been evident at Aarhus University for several years, for example, with the establishment of the Kitchen and the appointment of Distinguished Senior Innovators. And thanks to a recent infusion of additional core funding for innovation from the state’s ‘research reserve’ funds, innovation has just kicked into an even higher gear: AU has received 56 million kroner of earmarked innovation funding for 2026; from next year, the annual grants will increase to 93 million kroner through 2029. 

The senior management team has just decided how the funds will be invested – and according to Rector Brian Bech Nielsen, the goal is clear:

"The universities have been tasked with translating more research into innovation and entrepreneurship. We have to make thinking along these lines a part of our culture for researchers and students. And we also need facilities and infrastructure that make pursuing your ideas and collaborating with companies workable and attractive.”

The work starts here and now

The senior management team is strongly focused on ensuring that the new innovation funding has a genuine impact on the university’s research and teaching programmes as well as outside the university’s walls. To support this agenda, the primary strategic lever will be capacity-building; the other three strategic levers in the plan are:

• Capacity-building (creation of research and innovation positions)
• Entrepreneurship
• Infrastructure, support and organisation
• Strategy 2030

"Capacity building in particular is absolutely central. This is where we’ll be investing the majority of the funding, and this is also where it’s most urgent that we get moving," says Brian Bech Nielsen.

He explains that each faculty has received funding to create at least four new research and innovation positions, which will be advertised before the summer holidays. Faculties have a lot of flexibility here: they can recruit experienced researchers, for example Distinguished Senior Innovators, as well as early-career researchers.

In addition, funding has been earmarked to establish up to 32 research positions with a specific focus on innovation. Half of the vacancies will be advertised after the summer holidays, while the remainder will follow in early 2027. How many of these positions will be allocated to each faculty has not been set in advance; some of them may take the form of joint appointments, where the employee in question is affiliated with a company at the same time, which the senior management team views as an asset in itself:

We aim to markedly increase the creation of new knowledge‑based companies—an objective that is vital for the university and Denmark. But at the same time, we must continue to expand our contribution to the development of established companies and organisations,” states Lone Ryg Olsen, director of Enterprise and Innovation. 

New infrastructure for innovation

A new organisational and infrastructural framework is being created to provide support for the innovation agenda. This will include advances such as improvements to innovation hubs in Viborg and Herning and the establishment of a Makerspace at Partnerhuset.

In addition, a new Centre for Innovation and Entrepreneurship will strengthen the research foundation of the university’s innovation agenda by generating insight into how knowledge is translated into entrepreneurship and innovation by companies. The centre’s researchers will also contribute to strengthening links between the departments/schools and the Kitchen, and in the long term, the centre can ultimately provide a basis for a Master’s degree programme in entrepreneurship.

"This is a significant ambition both here in Denmark and at the European level for innovation to play a greater role at universities. That’s why this funding has been allocated to us. And with the initiatives we’re launching now, we’ll definitely be seeing more of an innovation mindset in our research and teaching programmes. This doesn’t mean that absolutely everyone has to work with with innovation. But our goal is for more staff and students to do so – and in any case, to give more of them the opportunity,” Brian Bech Nielsen concludes.