In 2019, the HPI hosted the business plan competition for the seventh time, with which it aims to support young start-ups in cooperation with the HPI Seed Fund. A total of 21 start-up teams with at least one HPI member participated in the competition. Since mid-May, the young entrepreneurs have been presenting their ideas and receiving targeted feedback and input over several phases in order to work intensively on their business model.
The winners of the HPI Business Plan Competition 2019: Medixflow
With the idea of automating the complex documentation in the care sector with a digital assistant, the founding team "Medixflow" was able to convince the jury and win the seventh business plan competition at the Hasso Plattner Institute (HPI). Already in the morning of September 3, Marcel Schmidberger (21), Fabio Schmidberger (21), and Erik Ziegler (21) were happy about the prize, which includes personal scholarships of up to €50,000, an investment offer of €50,000 from the HPI Seed Fund, and a one-year business coaching program at the HPI School of Entrepreneurship (E-School). The competition is organized by the E-School together with the HPI Seed Fund. The E-School also supports the teams in the process of developing their founding idea.
"Due to demographic change and a shortage of skilled nursing staff, the nursing crisis in Germany is becoming increasingly acute. Innovative software solutions can help relieve the burden on caregivers and give them more time for their residents," says Fabio Schmidberger, a student at the University of Stuttgart. HPI bachelor's graduate and twin brother Marcel Schmidberger adds: "The intelligent use of digital assistants in the care sector can lead to considerable time savings". The founders intend to use the profit to implement the first pilot projects in nursing homes and to work full-time on the further development of the application.
"We would like to encourage and support students at the HPI to start their own businesses and will continue to expand our entrepreneurship offerings in the coming years," says HPI Institute Director and jury member Professor Christoph Meinel. Together with Nicolai Bohn (Managing Director HPI Seed Fund) and Jonas Witt (HPI Alumnus and Serial Entrepreneur), Meinel congratulated the winners and presented a symbolic check for 100,000 euros.
The combination of practice-oriented university education and integrated entrepreneurship promotion at the HPI is unique and allows the young talents in Potsdam to benefit twice over: hpi.de/studium/entrepreneurship.html
