We are pleased to share that members of the FUNAMBULIST team — Philip Menke (UBONN), Leire San José (POLYMAT-EHU), and Giuliana Mosconi (POLYMAT-EHU) — together with our Project Coordinator, Prof. Dr. Thomas Schäfer (Ikerbasque-EHU), have participated in the EIC Tech2Market Venture Programme. This initiative, organised under the European Innovation Council (EIC), supports research teams in developing the entrepreneurial mindset, skills, and tools needed to translate deep-tech research into real-world market opportunities.
Coming from strong scientific backgrounds, we initially joined the programme with many questions and uncertainties about the entrepreneurial and business aspects of technology development. Throughout the training, we gained invaluable insights and shifted our perspective — learning to identify potential market needs, define value propositions, and explore pathways to bring scientific innovations beyond the lab and closer to industry.
This experience enabled us to take our first concrete steps in innovation thinking: we developed our first business model, prepared a pitch, and conducted stakeholder interviews to understand unmet needs and opportunities our research could address. We are deeply grateful to the organisers and mentors for their guidance, and to our team for embracing this challenge with enthusiasm.
This programme marks an exciting milestone as we continue strengthening the bridge between cutting-edge science and future applications.
