Written by Thomas Oeldemann (TU Dortmund) | January 10, 2025 | SHARE
The visit by Lehigh University to TU Dortmund focused on deepening collaboration in entrepreneurship and regional development, highlighting the Ruhr region's thriving startup ecosystem and fostering new partnerships for future projects
As the collaboration between Lehigh University and Technische Universität (TU) Dortmund has been gaining strength over the course of 2024, the end of the year was marked by a high-level visit to Dortmund by Lehigh officials.
"It is important to meet our strategic partner on a regular basis and discuss ideas for future projects face-to-face. This is the most productive way to reach new and innovative formats and ideas that we subsequently can put into practice,” said Cheryl Matherly, Vice President & Vice Provost for International Affairs at Lehigh.
The Lehigh delegation visited just before Christmas and put a renewed emphasis on collaborations in the field of entrepreneurship and regional development. The delegation was led by Matherly and Lisa Getzler, Vice Provost for Entrepreneurship.
“It is always a pleasure to elaborate new ideas in the field of entrepreneurship together with our colleagues from Lehigh,” said Tessa Flatten, Vice President for International Affairs at TU Dortmund. “We have been able to realize some fruitful and lively exchange formats, such as the yearly DLab visit to Lehigh’s TE Week, and we want to make sure that we continue this way and come up with new ideas that fill our partnership with life.”
Starting with a panel discussion on “Entrepreneurship and the Impact on Regional Economic Development,” the Lehigh delegates had the opportunity to gain a better understanding of the entrepreneurship environment in the Ruhr region. Formerly a coal mining region, the Ruhr region is now recognized in Europe for its thriving startup ecosystem, driven in part by university-industry-government partnerships.
The panel discussion included actors from both the regional and local community – amongst others representatives from the Ministry of Economic Affairs, Industry, Climate Action and Energy of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia, the city of Dortmund and the Chamber of Industry and Commerce of Dortmund – and gave a deeper understanding of funding mechanisms for entrepreneurial activities and the establishment and continuous growth of a wider ecosystem that entrepreneurs from the entire region benefit from.
While Till von den Driesch from the state ministry pointed out the special role that universities play in fostering entrepreneurship, Simone Herrmann from the chamber of commerce underlined the importance of clear supporting structures for entrepreneurs so that they can get quick and easy help for everyday questions that each entrepreneur faces – such as legal and tax questions.
Angela Märtin from the city of Dortmund also looked back and explained that in the 1960s, there were around 30,000 miners in Dortmund and no students at all, while nowadays the numbers are exactly the opposite. With this in mind, it is even more astonishing that the city of Dortmund won the renowned iCapital Award in 2021 – a prestigious European award that is given each year to the most innovative city in Europe.
Getzler, who took part in the panel discussion for Lehigh, was amazed by all the different levels of support for entrepreneurs: “From local to regional level, from universities to private enterprises: there is a whole network of supporting structures for entrepreneurs and a lot of financial initiatives that help young entrepreneurs grow. All this can clearly serve as a best-case example of how to support entrepreneurial activities.”
After the panel discussion, the Lehigh delegation and various TU Dortmund members split up into different workshop sessions to discuss ongoing and future projects that will help to strengthen the partnership between both institutions.
A workshop on India looked into the possibilities of trilateral cooperation between Germany, the US and India. Both Lehigh and TU Dortmund are increasing their activities on the South Indian subcontinent and are now looking into ways of how to work together with Indian partners in the field of entrepreneurship. Another workshop focused on the ongoing activities between TU Dortmund’s DLab and Lehigh’s TE Week and the planned exchange for 2025.
On the second day of the visit, the workshops continued, with one of them focusing on research in entrepreneurship. Since TU Dortmund’s visit to Lehigh in 2023, this topic has gained traction and both Willy Das (Senior Research Scientist) and Sam Dewalt (Managing Director at the Lehigh@NasdaqCenter) from Lehigh discussed with Daniela Gimenez-Jimenez, Simon Hensellek (both junior professors of entrepreneurship) and Katrin Bauer (senior researcher) from TU Dortmund further possible research topics in entrepreneurship.
The second workshop focused on broader joint activities between both universities in the field of entrepreneurship, for example between Lehigh’s VentureLab and TU Dortmund’s Centre for Entrepreneurship and Transfer (CET).
The two-day visit of the Lehigh delegation was concluded with a visit to Phoenix West, a prime example of regional transformation in Dortmund, and to the local Christmas market, where the Lehigh delegation had the chance to meet up with several alumni of the Transatlantic Ruhr Fellowship.