1 min read
SAP Next-Gen
Sector: Media, cleantech, healthtech, climate action, utilities, smart cities and governments, academia, aerospace, entertainment, edutainment
We are a purpose-driven innovation university and community, enabling entrepreneurs and startups to connect with corporates, partners and academia and inspire innovation and experiences that accelerate solutions to the UN Sustainable Development Goals.
SAP Next-Gen is a purpose-driven innovation university and community aligned with SAP’s commitment to the seventeen UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The SAP Next-Gen ecosystem includes a global network of educational institutions, labs, hubs, partners and NGOs, as well as innovation communities that help entrepreneurs and startups forge meaningful relationships with SAP’s customer and partner base. SAP Next-Gen enables corporates to seed in disruptive innovation and co-innovate new experiences with startups to both create new business value and scale impact for the SDGs. Local entrepreneurs and startups are encouraged to get involved at the HanaHaus at Newport Beach, which shares a building with the SAP Innovation Center Network.
SAP Next-Gen services include global goals houses, living rooms and neighborhoods, innovation tours, meetups, boot-camps, industry summits, matchmaking between startups and corporates as well as advising and projects within academia. Sandra Moerch-Petersen, chief content director for SAP Next-Gen, says, “We are driving an innovation-with-purpose movement, uniting an open community of change-makers implementing the SDGs as part of their startup ideas and solutions through tech and innovation.” SAP Next-Gen offers member startups, corporates and citizens a community with which to connect, team up and scale. “It’s often about having the right network, and we believe in open systems and providing access,” says Sandra.
One of the defining characteristics of LA’s innovation ecosystem is its abundant creativity. “LA is one of the world’s leading centers for storytelling arts,” says Ben Christensen, the global lead for the SAP Next-Gen science-fiction thinking community. Both Sandra and Ben advise startups to leverage creativity and the arts and to unlock their imaginations with science-fiction thinking to accelerate progress towards the UN SDGs. “For SAP Next-Gen’s communities of purpose and innovation, science-fiction thinking is an essential creative thread in the forward-looking ecosystem of LA,” says Ben. Adventurous innovators with purpose-driven mindsets can find a home in SAP Next-Gen’s LA and global networks.
Checklist
- Innovate with purpose.
Your innovations should be in the service of purpose and the SDGs. You should choose one or multiple SDGs in the development of your innovation and company as a guiding framework toward purpose and action to accelerate solutions toward the Global Goals. - Leverage exponential technologies.
Entrepreneurs and startups interested in connecting with the SAP Next-Gen global network should leverage exponential technologies and combine experience data with operational data to deliver insights leading to world-class experiences. - Don’t be shy about your ideas.
As a member of the LA ecosystem, you should embrace the creativity of the city. You should unleash imagination through science-fiction thinking to unlock the purpose and potential impact of your innovations.
Application can be sent via
sapnextgen@sap.com
The SAP Next-Gen program is a purpose driven innovation university and community for the SAP ecosystem enabling companies, partners and universities to connect and innovate with purpose linked to the UN Global Goals. Reimagine the future of industries with exponential technologies. Seed in disruptive innovation with startups. Build skills for digital futures. Showcase thought leadership.
sap.com/corporate/en/company/innovation/next-gen-innovation-platform.html