SPIN: Explore is a 10-hour online training course for Deep Tech researchers and scientists, organised by EIT Digital. It aims to inspire and empower participants, by equipping them with foundational business skills and stimulating their interest in the journey from lab to market. The course is delivered by external experts from EIT Digital’s network, providing insights on research commercialisation pathways, IPR strategy, scientific storytelling and innovation readiness.
Description
SPIN: Explore was delivered as a first pilot between October and November 2024 (22nd October-19th November). It consisted of a 2-hour lesson per week, for 5 weeks. Given the success of the first edition, EIT Digital is already planning the next SPIN: Explore cohorts for 2025.
With a curriculum that covers everything from understanding intellectual property rights to crafting compelling narratives for non-scientific audiences, SPIN Explore is a crash course in turning scientific breakthroughs into marketable innovations. Being free and online, it is accessible to participants from all over Europe and at any career stage.
EIT Digital’s focus on providing free high-quality training on research commercialisation to a large and diverse audience of researchers and scientists is in line with EU priorities on Technology Transfer and Knowledge Valorisation, as highlighted most recently in the Draghi report, which stressed that “the pipeline from innovation into commercialisation is weak” (Draghi, 2024, p. 24).
Achievements & learning
The first cohort of SPIN: Explore, for the now concluded 2024 pilot, was made up of 102 researchers, coming from 42 Universities and Research Organisations across 12 European countries. The class saw a balanced split of female and male participants, with 48% female participation. Also, researchers came from a wide variety of fields, from Biomedical Engineering to Physics, Material Science, AI/ML, Robotics, Environmental Engineering, Cybersecurity, Digital Manufacturing, Nanomaterials, Electronics, Advanced Manufacturing, Chemistry, just to name a few. The proportion of early-career researchers (PhD and PostDoc) was 47%, demonstrating the usefulness of this type of training for more experienced researchers too.
In course evaluation forms, participants highlighted the usefulness of speakers’ hands-on approach and the fact that they felt empowered, through the practical tools and techniques presented during the course, to better understand the economic and societal potential of their own developments. In addition to learning fundamental skills and joining the EIT Digital innovation ecosystem, participants also receive a certificate upon course completion which is validated by both EIT Digital and EIT, as SPIN: Explore has been officially awarded the EIT Label.
Partners & Sponsors
To deliver the first pilot, we partnered with organisations in EIT Digital's network, engaging external speakers who could deliver expert and high-quality training to participants on the topics of interest. In particular, we engaged speakers from TalTech, Tecnalia Ventures, the European IP Helpdesk and KTH Innovation.