Are you ready to bring your ideas for a sustainable food supply chain to life? Following the success of last year’s Winter School, Queen’s University Belfast, Technical University of Munich and University of Cambridge will come together to host an EIT Food Entrepreneurship Summer School this September in Belfast.

Programme description

During the EIT Food Summer School, 40 students from many different study backgrounds and countries will come together to bring their ideas for a sustainable food supply chain to life. Over the course of 6 days, participants will be working in interdisciplinary teams, to learn how digital technologies can be applied to foster sustainability and fair food supply chains. They will identify problems, prototype viable solutions with a validated value proposition and finally, pitch their results in front of a panel of experts.

The Summer School will take place in Belfast and be hosted by Queen's University Belfast along with partners, Technical University of Munich and the University of Cambridge. There will also be mentoring by industry experts and the chance to receive further online coaching on business model development.

Who should apply

Master students, PhD candidates, Post-docs and professionals.

Why should you apply

Participants will work together with mentors which will enable them to critically and precisely assess entrepreneurial concepts, enable professional communication, and presentation skills as well as interdisciplinary and intercultural skills.

Timeline of the programme

The programme will last for 6 days and will be based in Belfast.  There will be three workshops:

The first workshop will take place on 8 and 9 September and will be conducted by Queen’s University Belfast academics and researchers.  Participants will learn the importance of leadership for innovation and entrepreneurship in the food sector.  By way of team working, they will develop themselves as leaders, and learn to be effective and engaging communicators.  Additionally, participants will be able to distinguish leadership from management and will be able to appreciate how moving an idea from development into production requires different leadership approaches.  By the end of these two days, participants will be able to deliver impactful pitches and presentations.

The second workshop will take place on 10 and 11 September with coaching from the Technical University of Munich and industry experts.  Participants will learn about and apply Design Thinking methods to make Europe’s supply chains digital.  Based on the input on this topic received during the QUB workshop, a value proposition and product vision will be developed.

The final workshop will take place on 12 and 13 September.  Coaches from the University of Cambridge will take the ideas and products developed with QUB and TUM to the next level: these will be evaluated in terms of their commercial potential as well as their potential to solve a significant problem and the potential social and environmental impacts. The week will culminate with a structured pitch in front of a panel of entrepreneurs, industry partners, investors and support providers who will challenge the ideas and give feedback on the next steps of commercially viable and environmentally sustainable ideas.

Learning objectives and outcomes

Participants will gain knowledge of methodologies in product development in a food related start-up environment. They will enhance their ability to apply business model development and prototyping on practice-oriented problems in the field. The overall learning outcome for participants enables them to become responsible future innovators in Europe's food sector, which is equally important for both the economy and society.

Deadline for application

The EIT Food Summer School will accept 40 students in total. The spots will be filled on a rolling admissions basis. You will receive an invitation or rejection email, within two weeks of the closing date. This means you can submit your application between now and 20 July 2018 23.59 pm (BST). We will however, fill the available spots on a rolling basis according to our evaluation criteria, until they are full.

• The EIT Food Summer School does not charge a tuition fee.
• Travel costs: You will need to provide your own transportation to and from Belfast. Accommodation and meals between 7 and 14 September will be provided.

Applicants are required to submit an application, CV and video, in English.

In 2018, EIT Food will begin the initial phase of the development of EIT Food's flagship Food System Master Program, an integrated graduate degree program organized by 10 academic institutions and industrial partners from across EIT Foods pan-European partner network to prepare students to drive a future transformation of the food system and increase the competitiveness of their future employing companies. It promotes an integration of the food system by providing students with the opportunity to study consecutively at three institutions who provide distinctly different semester blocks focusing on different parts of the food system. This is coupled with a partner-mentored project/thesis work and non/academic activities offered by industrial partners.

Are you a food sector professional from a RIS country? Do you want to improve your skills in New Product Development? We invite you to be one of 25 selected participants in the EIT Food Summer School on new product development for the food industry!

During an intensive 8 day workshop, our industry experts will present not only how to create and execute NPD by understanding the market and consumer’s needs, but also provide insight on how to handle competing project requirements and constraints. Put simply, you will be given the entire spectrum of knowledge required to be an expert of New Product Development and much more.

It’s not a school, if you only listen! That’s why we included Design Thinking workshops and hands-on experience in a simulated environment. Sounds interesting? That’s not all! Thanks to cooperation with market leaders from the food sector, we will show you where these theories meet reality. You’ll get to analyse actual case studies of NPD successes and failures learning from others real life experiences!

The EIT Food Summer School is organized by: École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (Switzerland), Maspex (Poland), PepsiCo (UK), Technion – Israel Institute of Technology (Israel), University of Warsaw (Poland)