From Sports Furniture for Holistic Training Through Social Design to Smart Wood: Five Start-Up Ideas Selected for the neudeli Fellowship

The range of ideas submitted for the fourteenth cycle of the neudeli Fellowship was once again broad. »It’s fantastic to see applications coming from all four faculties at the Bauhaus-Universität Weimar. I find the amount of start-up ideas taking a sustainable approach truly remarkable. We are increasingly seeing social awareness and greater environmental responsibility when we read through the concepts,« notes Josephine Zorn, who is a coach at the neudeli start-up hub. »And methods also exist to make these start-up ideas economically viable—neudeli start-ups such as Industrierelikt or the Röstbrüder are proof of this,« Zorn continues.

In this round, a jury of experts also decided on allocation of the total budget of €6,000 and awarding of the coaching packages. Five business ideas were conferred prizes:

• »aestheno« is an innovative piece of sports furniture developed by architecture student Dominik Hesse during the coronavirus pandemic. The holistic approach and multifunctionality of »aestheno« are close to his heart. Over the next six months, Dominik now hopes to create his first prototype, establish partnerships and refine his business model.
• Alina Warsinsky has specialised in social design during her product design studies and wishes to offer senior citizens living in nursing homes new opportunities to have experiences and exchanges with her start-up project. She has already developed two ideas for this as part of a design module. With the help of the neudeli Fellowship, these should now be implemented and tested in collaboration with the senior citizens at Sophienhaus Weimar.
• Chilean José Antonio Vergara has developed an immersive piano setup that offers classical music enthusiasts an entirely new sound experience. The neudeli Fellowship will help José to flesh out his business model and define the potential market.
• With the »Füllhorn Ensemble Market Garden«, civil engineer Aryn Machell is aiming to bring »market gardening« to Weimar. This sustainable and at the same time highly efficient method of vegetable cultivation dispenses entirely with the use of machines. In the neudeli Fellowship, Aryn would like to continue the search for a suitable space for his project in the Weimar area and to engage with his potential customers.
• Miriam Fuchs and Henrik Norderhus are absolute experts on timber construction. They’ve come to the Bauhaus-Universität Weimar to complete Master’s degrees. Together, they want to make wood smarter and therefore even more attractive as a building material. The neudeli Fellowship will, among other things, allow them to evaluate their idea with timber construction specialists from the architecture firm Hartung & Ludwig and to develop preliminary prototypes.

Over the next six months, the neudeli Fellows will complete a number of start-up workshops together during which the coaches of the start-up hub will mediate knowledge and methods. These start-up workshops will help them to develop their own start-up idea and the associated business model further in a user-focused manner. The structured offers will be complemented with 1-on-1 coaching, neudeli community events and a budget for things such as the construction of prototype.

About the neudeli Fellowship:
The neudeli Fellowship is the Bauhaus-Universität Weimar’s start-up programme. It offers up-and-coming entrepreneurs comprehensive support for the further development of innovative ideas in the form of a budget for materials, coaching and access to the workrooms and workshops in the start-up villa.

Since the summer semester 2021, it has been possible to take the neudeli Fellowship as a Bauhaus.Module. This allows students to prepare their start-up while also earning credit points for their studies. 

A huge thanks to the sponsors of the neudeli Fellowship start-up programme:
BATT mbH, Weimar-Werk GmbH, bm-t Beteiligungsmanagement Thüringen GmbH, Thüringer Aufbaubank, the town of Weimar, APROPRO – HAARBECK PROJEKTMANAGEMENT, Architektur- und Planungsgesellschaft mbH Hartung & Ludwig, Meissner Bolte & Partner, GRUENDELPARTNER, the Weimar institute for voice coaching (Institut für Sprechbildung Weimar), StartNext 

Contact:
»neudeli« start-up hub
Bauhaus-Universität Weimar
Helmholtzstraße 15
99425 Weimar

Tel.: +49 (0) 36 43/58 39 24
Fax: +49 (0) 36 43/58 39 21
Email: neudeli[at]uni-weimar.de