Stage Two: Pan-European Start-up Competition Provides Platform for Innovators

With the aim of providing a stage for the next generation of research-based, disruptive start-ups and bringing together innovative minds with supporters from research, business and finance, RWTH Aachen and the Leipzig Graduate School of Management (HHL) have launched the pan-European start-up competition “Stage Two” set up. On October 19th, 50 start-ups from research, innovation and start-up universities from more than 20 European countries, more than 100 investors and numerous experts from industry will come together in Berlin for the third time to work together to find solutions for to find the great challenges of our time.

“Stage Two” was initiated as part of the EXIST-Potentials initiative of the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Protection. RWTH was one of twelve universities across Germany to be awarded the “Convince Internationally” funding line, which supports universities with existing transfer structures and regional networks in the internationalization of their start-up activities. “Stage Two” has quickly established itself as the largest pan-European competition for university start-ups at an early stage. With a total amount of 3.5 million euros, the prize money for the third edition not only doubled compared to the first year, but also increased significantly compared to the previous year.

Robert Habeck as patron

This year, the patron of “Stage Two” is Federal Minister of Economics Robert Habeck. “In countless start-ups in Germany and Europe, bright minds develop business models every day that help to cleverly meet the challenges of our time. These good ideas often become even better when they are shared and discussed with each other. This requires meeting places. With Stage Two, just such a place has been created. The leading international event for university spin-offs, which has become firmly established within a short period of time, brings together start-ups from all over Europe. The competition on stage offers young companies a great opportunity to compete with each other, to be seen, to draw attention to themselves – and in this way, for example, to enter into discussions with potential financiers. This is how ideas become reality! I am therefore happy to take on the patronage of the event with my company and wish everyone involved much success!” explains Habeck.

“We are pleased that Robert Habeck is taking over the patronage and as such represents the core of Stage Two: What unites our pan-European community is the desire to use research and innovation to find solutions to the most pressing challenges of our time and to actively shape the future “, explains Malte Brettel, Professor of Innovation and Entrepreneurship at RWTH.

The semi-finals and final of “Stage Two” in Berlin are preceded by a local university round (“Stage One”), in which the entrepreneurship centers of the participating universities each select their best start-up, which will compete on the international stage in October. IonKraft will enter the race for RWTH. IonKraft’s mission is to make plastic packaging recyclable for barrier applications using plasma technology. Many chemical products have high demands on their packaging. The packaging must be very tight and chemically resistant. Therefore, multi-material packaging is often used, which is often expensive and difficult to recycle. IonKraft has developed a chemically resistant plasma coating.