We invite you to read the interview with prof. dr hab. Hieronim Maciejewski - Director of the Poznań Science and Technology Park, which appeared in the March issue of "University News".
Interview conducted by Ewa Kawałko-Marczuk.
On 9th February 2022, a letter of intent on cooperation between UMCS, the Lublin Commune and the Poznań Science and Technology Park was signed in Lublin. Could you explain how this cooperation was established? Why did you decide to support Lublin and share your knowledge and nearly thirty years of experience here?
The Poznań Science and Technology Park (pl. PPNT) has been focusing on networking and cooperation with various innovation ecosystem stakeholders since its inception. We have never narrowed down to our region, and on the contrary, we are closer to the national and, above all, international perspective. Considering this approach and very convenient access, Lublin is not as far from Poznań as it might seem. The idea of establishing cooperation was born almost a year ago, when at the invitation of prof. Ryszard Naskręcki, the director of ECOTECH-COMPLEX and the then director of the PPNT, prof. Jacek Guliński, it is a pleasure to visit this excellent centre. During the visit, we also had very fruitful talks with the UMCS rector, prof. Radosław Dobrowolski and dr. Mariusz Sagan, director of the Strategy and Entrepreneurship Department at the Lublin City Hall. We are always happy to share our knowledge and experience with institutions that want to develop entrepreneurship, implement innovations, and commercialize knowledge and technologies. Undoubtedly, both UMCS and the Lublin Commune are such entities.
One of the signatories of the letter of intent is the Lublin Commune. Why is it essential to involve local government in cooperation between scientific units in research and development?
The local government should follow trends and stimulate innovation by motivating enterprises to search for new concepts, products, and cooperation with the academic community. It is essential that communes, using various available tools, such as funds, programs, and innovation centres, actively cooperate with research institutions and create an entrepreneurial atmosphere. Why? Highly speaking: for the common good. In practice, however, this translates into retaining young talents in the commune, attracting specialized employees to local enterprises, foreign investments, including corporate research and development centres, and broadly understood raising awareness and welfare of citizens. Importantly, we are now probably functioning in a different, more favourable reality. More and more scientists and entrepreneurs cooperate in research and development projects. More and more large enterprises decide to create departments to cooperate with start-ups - young technology companies. The local government should support and develop such a state of affairs, and Lublin, from what I have observed, has just such intentions.
Prof. Ryszard Naskręcki mentioned the report that you developed as PPNT concerning ECOTECH-COMPLEX. What, in your opinion, is the potential hidden in this place, and also in Lublin itself?
The visit to Lublin made us realize that this place has great potential, mainly due to a coherent vision of development and an excellent atmosphere of cooperation between the Lublin Commune and the UMCS authorities. Contrary to appearances, this is not a common phenomenon in Poland. So you can be proud of the president's approach and the chancellors. The ECOTECH-COMPLEX Centre itself, its infrastructure and unique research equipment create significant development opportunities. It is the beginning of its functioning. Therefore, efforts should be made to revive and promote the centre's activities not only in the academic and industrial environment of the City of Lublin. Therefore, in the summary of our visit (I would instead not call it a report), we declared help at various stages of development and suggested several ideas, incl. It is creating a coworking space - a kind of pre-incubator that meets the potential to create start-ups (in the form of spin-offs) from the environment of the Lublin University Association. You can also organize competitions for business plans for ZUL doctoral students and establish small grants to support start-ups within the centre. Finally, audits can be carried out in selected enterprises in terms of their potential interest in the possibilities and advisory services of the centre. These are just some of the topics in which we can support ECOTECH-COMPLEX activities with our knowledge and experience.
Finally, I would like to ask about the Poznań Science and Technology Park. This is a unique place - it deals with creating entrepreneurship and development, but at the same time, it has the status of a scientific unit. Could you tell us a bit about your activities?
From the beginning of the PPNT, in addition to the activities typical for parks related to incubating and supporting entrepreneurship, we also developed research services to solve technological problems arising in companies, both those located in the PPNT outside it. With time, we started to research and development activities on our subject. This resulted in appropriate scientific achievements, thanks to which we were able to undergo evaluation as a research unit.
Currently, having the status of a research unit of category A, we invite companies interested in outsourcing research and development works to our R&D Hub. Thanks to a team of experts/scientists and research infrastructure, we solve technological problems. We operate flexibly, minimize formalities, optimize costs, and adjust the form of cooperation to the company's needs.
The second area of our activity is consulting in innovation implementation, fundraising and training to support the creative search for solutions. In addition, as a Digital Innovation Hub, we provide companies with tools that help them identify areas of change, improve the organization, develop ideas and implement new technologies.
Currently, we are the only company in Poland to run an international program for start-ups. We have recruited over 120 of the best European deep tech start-ups. Our partners are over 50 international corporations and 100 representatives of VC and Business Angels funds. We offer young technology companies three profiled support paths: the Investment Readiness Program, the International Incubation Program and the Program of Cooperation with Corporations. Our actions bring significant benefits to both companies and our partners.
We have always said that the park is not a developer renting and managing space. We want to consciously create a park community consisting of innovative companies focused on cooperation with our experts, development, implementation of innovations and networking. Currently, we have 62 companies in the PPNT, and over 90% of the space is leased.
After almost 27 years of the park's operation, we have all the "park" instruments for stimulating, incubating and developing innovation and entrepreneurship, technology transfer and supporting SMEs. This makes us a thriving centre that promotes and supports cooperation between science and business. And not only in our region. Our strength is not infrastructure, apparatus, buildings, but people. As Chris Darimont said, much of the advancement in science has been made possible by independent people who think differently. Moreover, there was no shortage of such at the PPNT, and there is no shortage of them.
Photo Poznań Science and Technology Park
