SMILE is the start-up initiative of Leipzig University. Since 2006, SMILE has been supporting free of cost students, alumni, doctoral candidates and employees on their way to becoming self-employed. The interdisciplinary initiative SMILE cooperates with a variety of universities and offers customised services from different areas. SMILE thus offers entrepreneurs the opportunity to discover, use and expand their potential and their skills.
Starting a business with SMILE
The Self Management Initiative Leipzig (SMILE) was established in 2006 and is a joint project of Leipzig University, the HHL Leipzig Graduate School of Management and the Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research (UFZ). The initiative is funded by the European Union, the Free State of Saxony and the participating institutions, as well as the Leipzig Foundation for Innovation and Technology Transfer.
SMILE offers founders a comprehensive range of services: On their way to self-employment, the start-up network accompanies them from the initial idea to its realisation.
The SMILE modules
So how good is an idea? What do potential customers think about a new service or product? With the help of modern market research methods SMILE provides answers to these questions. SMILE.markttest also supports the process of designing prototypes of products or services. Existing data material is reviewed and analysed at Desk Research.
SMILE in numbers
9,000
participants
470
supported start-ups
1,100
jobs created
33 million
funds raised
120
prizes won
100
workshops per semester
A selection of succesful start-ups
With the help of SMILE more than 470 new businesses have already been launched. Here are a few examples.
The software service provider Webdata Solutions supports its customers in optimising profit margins and using resources efficiently. The company's services include software-based solutions for market and product range analysis, price monitoring and price management. Among the company's customers are well-known online shops and leading brands. In addition, the company cooperates with a number of technology and distribution partners. The two co-founders and former employees of Leipzig University, Sabine Maßmann and Dr Hanna Köpcke, today are part of the company's management team. In the early phase, the start-up was financially supported by the TGFS (Technologiegründerfonds Sachsen). Today, Webdata Solutions has about 15 employees.
SMILE's expert network has helped us tremendously in many stages of the business creation.
The online radio station detektor.fm, operated by the BEBE Medien GmbH, offers an online radio programme with journalistic information on politics, economics and culture as well as modern pop music. In addition, detektor.fm is a service provider for podcasts and audio productions. The radio station detektor.fm targets young people, mostly academics, throughout Germany, especially in large cities and university cities. Before the foundation in 2009, the founders together with SMILE developed a business plan. The co-founder and present CEO Christian Bollert is, like many other employees of detektor.fm, an alumnus of Leipzig University.
Since its foundation in 2009, the BEBE Medien GmbH and its programme detektor.fm have received numerous awards, including the German Radio Prize (2012), the European Podcast Award (2012), the Ernst Schneider Prize (2017) and three nominations for the Grimme Online Award (2011, 2013, 2017). Moreover, detektor.fm is the audio partner of many newspapers and organisations, such as the Süddeutsche Zeitung, Zeit Online, the taz, Politico Europe, the Max Planck Society, the Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research and the Leibniz Institute for the History and Culture of Eastern Europe (GWZO).
During the preparation of the set-up, SMILE helped us a lot with bringing our ideas together into a business plan. Especially the discussions about and analyses of our business idea helped us to make progress.
The core competence of the Effigos AG is the visualisation of complex information from the life sciences. For this purpose, the company creates highly detailed 3D graphics and interactive applications all the way down to the cellular level. Effigos AG's digital models are used in educational institutions, science, the press or industry and commerce. The current chairman of the board, Dr Jens Grosche, and former biologists and bioinformaticians of our University are members of the founding team. In the early phase of the company's foundation, the firm was supported by the Leipzig Chamber of Industry and Commerce (IHK) and the Sächsische Aufbaubank (SAB) within the framework of the programmes "Wirtschaft trifft Wissenschaft" (Business meets Science) and "Gemeinschaftsaufgabe Verbesserung der regionalen Wirtschaftsstruktur - GRW" (a joint initiative for the improvement of regional economic structures).
With SMILE we had a reliable partner at our side, who provided orientation and protection for the first autonomous steps. In addition to important know-how on setting up a company, the time spent at LEO was a valuable support for us.