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Winter semester 2020/2021hei_INNOVATION talks: Entrepreneurship

In the winter semester 20/21, heiINNOVATION presents a series of talks on the topic of entrepreneurship and innovation that will accompany the entrepreneurship lecture at Heidelberg University. It takes place every other Monday, starting November 9, 2020 and features renowned speakers from the fields of entrepreneurship, innovation management, and business model innovation from the Rhine-Neckar region.

The talks start at 5 pm and will take place ONLINE either in English or German; they are public and everybody is welcome to join.

 

Monday, 9 November 2020, 5 p.m.

Success Story

Thorsten Schmidt
Director and CEO, Heidelberger Frühling

Language: German

Thorsten Schmidt is the founding director of the “Heidelberger Frühling” music festival, which is one of the most renowned and largest festivals in Germany. After working in Frankfurt and Mainz, the graduate economist has continuously established the classical music festival since 1997 as a source of inspiration, an enabler and a place of artistic freedom. It now attracts more than 47,000 visitors to Heidelberg every year. In 2005 he expanded the company by founding the independent “Heidelberg String Quartet Festival,” the first of its kind in the festival landscape. Since 2011, the Academies for Lied, Chamber Music and Music Journalism and the “LAB” production think tank have been a central pillar in the sustainable promotion of the future. Igor Levit, Thomas Hampson and Eleonore Büning are artistic directors of the academies. Since 2013, the Heidelberg Music Conference – launched by Schmidt – has been one of the most important meeting places for the classical music industry. The "International Lied Center", which he initiated in 2016, brings together all of the festival's lied activities: from the “Das Lied” competition under the jury chairmanship of Thomas Quasthoff, which has been organized under the umbrella of the Lied Center since 2017, to the “Neuland.Lied” song festival and various “Lied.LABs” that develop new performance formats.

 

Thorsten Schmidt

Monday, 23 November 2020, 5 p.m.

How to Fail

Jens Schmelzle
Founder of startups, simpleshow, Kraftpaule, alphabeet

Language: English

Jens Schmelzle actually wanted to become a rock star. By chance, he and his band colleague founded the company simpleshow in 2008 - today the world's largest explanatory video service provider. Further foundations followed, and he became an entrepreneur of passion. With his current startup alphabeet, Jens Schmelzle is committed to the ecological self-cultivation of vegetables and also passes on his founding experiences as a lecturer and startup coach. He would still like to be a rock star, though.

 

Jens Schmelzle

Monday, 7 December 2020, 5 p.m.

Startups vs. Academia

Dr. Simone Burel
Founder and CEO, LUB GmbH; linguistic consultant; author; board member; investor

Language: German

Dr. Simone Burel is a shareholder and managing director of LUB GmbH, which she founded in 2015 on the basis of her dissertation on the language of the DAX-30. She has received several awards for her research and practical work, among others from the online platform academics as one of the top ten scientists in 2017, the Society for Applied Linguistics and the highest endowed business development prize of the city of Mannheim. In 2020 Dr. Simone Burel was appointed to the Economic Advisory Board of bw-i (Baden-Württemberg International GmbH) and to the Board of Trustees of the Friends of the University of Mannheim. Among other things, she is also chairwoman of the Advisory Board of the Spenoki GmbH.

Livestream (Zoom)

Dr. Simone Burel

Monday, 14 December 2020, 5 p.m.

What Happens After the First Down?

Julia Piechotta
Co-Founder and CEO, Spoontainable

Language: English

After studying economics at Goethe University in Frankfurt, Julia Piechotta met her co-founder Amelie during her master’s studies in management at the University of Hohenheim. Together they founded the start-up Spoontainable in 2018 to establish sustainable plastic alternatives on the market. They have already been able to replace more than two million plastic spoons with the edible plastic alternative.

Livestream (Zoom)

Julia Piechotta

Monday, 11 January 2021, 5 p.m.

The Importance of a Team

Dr. habil. Daniel Kondermann
Managing Director and Founder, Quality Match

Language: English

Daniel Kondermann did his habilitation at Heidelberg University in the field of machine learning and data science. His startup, the Pallas Ludens GmbH, enabled automotive and medical imaging companies to collect large machine training datasets. After three years, in 2016, he and his team joined Apple, where he worked for three years on dataset design, annotation and data quality for computer vision tasks. In 2019, Daniel founded two new companies he is now leading as managing director; one is about dataset quality assurance (Quality Match GmbH) and one is an app named Flax, which facilitates friend meetup organization. He also works as business angle with a number of investments in games and machine learning.

Livestream (Zoom)

Dr. habil. Daniel Kondermann

Monday, 8 February 2021, 5 p.m.

Business Model Innovation in a Corporate Setting

Samy Jandali
Vice President G-FDB/B Digital Business Models, BASF SE

Language: English

Samy Jandali is currently Vice President for Digital Business Empowerment for the BASF Group, and is responsible for developing New Digital Business Models for the company. He is also in charge of BASF e-commerce platforms. Before that, Samy Jandali acted as Vice President of BASF’s Nutrition & Health business in North America. His area of responsibility comprised Pharma Ingredients, Aroma Ingredients, Animal Nutrition and Human Nutrition. He has been with the BASF Group for 21 years. Before moving to the US, Samy Jandali was Head of Sales for BASF’s pharmaceutical ingredients business in Europe. During this time, he helped to bring new innovations to the customers.

During his career, Samy Jandali has held various positions in purchasing and implemented globally coordinated purchasing teams. He handled large investment projects for the company and gained international experience by spending several years in Korea, China and Malaysia. On the side he was also operating his own company, consulting SMEs in the area of purchasing and sales.

Samy Jandali holds a degree of economics from Philipps University in Marburg, Germany.

Livestream (Zoom)

Samy Jandali

Monday, 22 February 2021, 5 p.m.

From Zero to Awesome

Christian Wiens
Co-Gründer und CEO, Getsafe

Language: English

As the founder and CEO of Getsafe, Christian Wiens wants to challenge one of the largest industries in the world by building one of the world’s up and coming digital insurance companies. He holds a master’s degree in mechanical engineering, and is already an experienced digital entrepreneur with a strong background in tech and product development. At Getsafe, Christian Wiens is responsible for the company's strategy and product, investor relations, and communications. Previously, he founded and was the CEO of gourmeo.com, which he successfully sold to the Müller Media Group.

Livestream (Zoom)

Christian Wiens