A Pioneer in Technology Transfer and Startup Support: Prof. Andreas Pinkwart bids farewell – successful course for entrepreneur­ship culture to continue

TUD Dresden University of Technology bids farewell to Prof. Andreas Pinkwart, Chair of Innovation and Technology Management and Director of the Excellence Center for Innovation, Transfer and Entrepreneurship (TUD|excite). For family reasons Prof. Pinkwart is leaving earlier than envisaged, in order to live closer to his family in North Rhine-Westphalia.

With his experience from previous roles as a university administrator, science policy maker, economist, and proven expert in entrepreneurship, he provided crucial impetus for the strategic development of TUD on its path to becoming one of the most innovation-oriented and transfer-oriented universities in Germany. He leaves behind a strong foundation for the continued development of innovation, technology transfer, and entrepreneurship at TUD — and thus an excellent basis for his succession, which is already underway. TUD is ensuring that the university’s highly successful progress in the area of transfer and commercialization will continue.

Prof. Ursula Staudinger, Rector of TUD:  “When we appointed Prof. Andreas Pinkwart to TUD, our goal was to integrate our outstanding strengths in research, innovation, and technology transfer even more closely and to consistently advance the objective, anchored in our Excellence Strategy, of building an ecosystem with strong capabilities in innovation and technology transfer. Andreas Pinkwart pursued this mission with extraordinary commitment, strategic foresight, and impressive networking capabilities. With TUD|excite, the ExciteLab, the Startup Factory boOst, and numerous other initiatives, he has provided decisive impulses that radiates far beyond our university. He has helped to make TUD an even stronger driving force for innovation, entrepreneurship, and value creation at the science and technology hub of Dresden and throughout Saxony. We are deeply grateful for his contributions. We profoundly regret his earlier-than-planned retirement, but at the same time, we respect his wish to live closer to his family in the future. We will consistently continue along the successful path he has prepared.”

Prof. Andreas Pinkwart: “The opportunity to help shape the establishment of TUD|excite and the further development of innovation, technology transfer, and entrepreneurship at TUD was a great honor and joy for me. Together with many dedicated colleagues both within and outside the university, we succeeded in establishing important structures, partnerships, and initiatives for this purpose — from the ExciteLab to the Startup Factory boOst and the TUD|InnoX campuses. My special thanks go to the TUD university management, our partners from academia, business, and politics, as well as the numerous aspiring entrepreneurs and founders who made this path possible and helped shape it. The foundation has been laid, the direction is clear, and the prospects for continued development and potential are enormous. I look to TUD’s future with great confidence, while also seeing an opportunity to take on new responsibilities that will bring me closer to my home region. I will continue to follow TUD’s development with great interest.”

The establishment of TUD|excite is inextricably linked to Andreas Pinkwart’s work: Under his leadership, the university’s activities in the areas of patents, innovation promotion, corporate partnerships, and knowledge and technology transfer were strategically and organizationally consolidated for the first time into a Central Unit.

Among the most significant achievements of his tenure are the founding of ExciteLab as an accelerator for high-tech startups, the establishment of the Startup Campus Alliance of universities in Saxony and Thuringia, as well as his involvement in applying for and securing a multi-million-euro grant for the Startup Factory boOst in the federal government’s EXIST flagship competition. This project aims to significantly increase the number of knowledge-based spin-offs in Central Germany and, in particular, to help deep-tech companies reach international growth levels.

A particular focus in recent months has been on the preliminary work for establishing two of the three planned TUD|InnoX campuses at the Gläserne Manufaktur Dresden (GMD). The creation of the InnoX Campuses is a centerpiece of TUD’s next Excellence Strategy funding period (2027–2033). They will create a new structure for close collaboration between cutting-edge scientific research—particularly in the fields of microelectronics, chip design, artificial intelligence, robotics, materials research, automated driving, and the circular economy—and selected strategic corporate partners.

“Andreas Pinkwart has driven this process forward so effectively and so far that we will soon be able to complete it. We owe him our sincere gratitude for this as well,” said TUD Rector Staudinger.

Andreas Pinkwart will join the Executive Board of the Bertelsmann Foundation on July 1, 2026, and will assume a senior professorship in Strategic Entrepreneurship at his alma mater, the University of Bonn, on October 1, 2026.

Background: TUD: A Leader in Innovation and Technology Transfer

For many years, TUD has been among Germany’s most innovative and technology-transfer-oriented universities. According to a new survey by the German Economic Institute (IW), TUD is Germany’s university with the most patents, having filed a total of 1,683 patents and spawned 301 companies between 2000 and 2022. A study on the regional economic significance of TUD, commissioned by TUD from DIW Econ, a subsidiary of the German Institute for Economic Research, shows that these innovation and technology transfer activities contribute significantly to Saxony’s economic development. For example, 92 percent of the companies spun off from the university are headquartered in Dresden and make a direct contribution to the region’s value creation.

About:  Prof. Andreas Pinkwart

Prof. Andreas Pinkwart was appointed to the Chair of Innovation and Technology Management at the Faculty of Business and Economics at TUD, established as part of the Excellence Strategy, effective March 1, 2023. Previously, he served as Minister for Innovation, Science, Research, and Technology, as well as Minister for Economic Affairs, Innovation, Digitalization, and Energy for the State of North Rhine-Westphalia, Rector of the Leipzig Graduate School of Management (HHL), and Professor at the University of Siegen. As a researcher, university leader, and politician, he has played a significant role over several decades in shaping Germany’s innovation and entrepreneurial ecosystems.

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