For the second time, students of the "Leading Innovative Organizations" (LIO) program – supported by IFI professor Matthias Fink (picture)  – won the “Global Scaling Challenge”. The task: In one week, the students had to develop growth strategies for three real-life problems of aviation companies. They had to work on market entry, growth and financing strategies in this short time and they prevailed against an impressive number of competitors: 25 teams from 19 universities in Europe, Asia and America competed this year in the international "Global Scaling Challenge".

The LIO students were supported by three mentors: Matthias Fink, Professor of Innovation Management at the JKU, Albert Ortig, JKU graduate and entrepreneur, and Hans Landström, Professor of Entrepreneurship at Lund University in Sweden. At the end of the week, the projects were judged by an international jury of experts which consisted of venture capital investors, entrepreneurs and researchers.

The jury members particularly praised the holistic approach and sense of responsibility of the JKU team. In the concepts, objectives from different areas such as economy, ecology and sociology were harmonised. This earned the students a daily and overall victory with prize money of 40,000 euros. "Apparently we are doing something right in the education of our students. Unbelievable how they fought," says Matthias Fink after the successful competition. Congratulations also came from Helmut Pernsteiner, Dean of the Faculty of Social and Economic Sciences at JKU: "An outstanding success for our Master's programme and a great contribution to the international reputation of management education at Johannes Kepler University Linz." The Master's programme "Leading Innovative Organizations" is an intensive programme at JKU. Students can complete the Master's degree in one year in small groups. The programme is open to applicants with previous studies from all fields.

More Information, opens an external URL in a new window