The competition included presentations by eight university-based ideas from Győr and Mosonmagyaróvár, followed by a technical workshop where participants practiced the first steps of launching a startup business and team building.

The President of the NRDI Office was pleased to visit the first venue of the programme series in Győr where innovation and university-industry cooperation forms part of the city's identity. In his welcome speech József Pálinkás emphasized that the new “startup generation” of Hungary is now offered a great opportunity by having access to EU funds of HUF 5 billion for developing the innovation ecosystem throughout the country and laying the foundations of incubation systems in less developed regions. In order to make this application scheme a value-creating and effective tool of promoting the development of the startup ecosystem, the NRDI Office used the experience gained from previous, less successful application schemes while designing the call announced last autumn. In the new application scheme, the state delegates the responsibility of selecting startups to incubators. Sharing business risks is an important feature from the point of view of public financing, while startups will benefit from the incubators’ increased flexibility in tracking the implementation of ideas and the financing procedures for the mentored startup projects.

The Startup Campus university incubation programme supported by the NRDI Office will carry on with further events in Kecskemét and Debrecen in April.