Industry Sounding Board

“The Industry Sounding Board has accompanied IT:U since its foundation. We regularly present our approaches to research and teaching there and receive valuable feedback and support. There is a great deal of interest from industry in our project-orientated teaching methodology”.

“I support the IT:U Sounding Board because I am convinced that initiatives in education, research and innovation are the best investments in our future. Linz is the founding location of Dynatrace, from here we have grown with over 10 years of experience in AI research and development to a company with a turnover of over 1 billion euros. Due to our growth, we are looking for international experts who conduct research at the interface of science and business in order to drive digitalisation in companies and society. IT:U will also produce such talents”.

“The digital transformation is one of the key challenges of our time. It affects every single company and therefore our shared business location. It influences competitiveness and future readiness, and at the same time opens up huge new market potential. In order to meet the challenge as a company and optimally utilise the potential of the ongoing transformation, one thing is needed above all: highly qualified experts and IT specialists who are in charge of driving the implementation forward. Every company needs this expertise in-house. And this is precisely where IT:U comes in under the title ‘Interdisciplinary Transformation’ and thus makes an important contribution to Upper Austria as an industrial and business location. As the KEBA Group, we are not only delighted about this great addition to the Upper Austrian university landscape, but also about being part of the IT:U Sounding Board together with other companies, the Federation of Austrian Industries and the Chamber of Commerce. In direct exchange with the team around Prof. Dr. Stefanie Lindstaedt, we can actively help shape the future, position our needs and define common directions in a constructive dialogue. After all, as a company in Upper Austria, we are all part of a great and successful ecosystem in which it is important to get involved, support each other and thus create real win/win situations”.

“As an entrepreneur and a representative of the IT sector, I support IT:U because technical expertise alone is no longer sufficient today. Austria has a remarkable tradition of engineering excellence that has often given us an edge globally. However, in an increasingly complex world, mastering technology alone is not enough. To tackle the upcoming challenges, we need more: people who think outside the box, who connect various disciplines, and who can develop creative, holistic solutions. We need a space where technology, business, and society come together to foster new perspectives and drive innovation. The greatest successes arise when complex matters are not just understood technically but are approached within broader contexts. For this, we need minds that can think in networks, work creatively, and operate across disciplines – exactly the kind of skills IT:U instills”.

“The new way of project-based learning corresponds exactly to the information search in an industrial project. Together with interdisciplinary research and the new governance model IT:U complements the existing university network and marks a big chance for the business hub Upper Austria. Hueck Folien does industrial production and R+D in Upper Austria since more than 50 years and is specialised on web coating of functional and optical surfaces. Additionally to high skilled technical experts we need digital transformers with interdisciplinary skills. I am very excited about this new way of IT:U in teaching and research. Therefore I am committed to support the build-up of this new university from the very beginning and bringing in needs and topics of the industry in the Industry Sounding Board”.