With a view to ensuring a successful future for the Institute for Entrepreneurship, entrepreneurship and innovation have been singled out as the principal thematic areas. Here the Institute is not only following its original inspiration of consistently encouraging entrepreneurial thinking and activity with the aim of promoting innovative capability in individuals, companies and regions – it also aspires to give a direct response to the challenges of Liechtenstein as an economic hub.
Consistent ongoing development
‘Business models must be consistently refined and subjected to questioning on an ongoing basis,’ says the new Head of the Institute Sascha Kraus, ‘and that applies to our country just as it does to our Institute.’ Otherwise, in his view, you can hardly hope to meet the ever more rapidly changing conditions of the times with any degree of success. So the Institute for Entrepreneurship is building on a firm base of past experience, successes and awards, but at the same time making its key areas of expertise fit for the future. This is associated above all with the clear linking of specific thematic areas to the three teaching chairs of the Institute, along with the reallocation and clear demarcation of spheres of responsibility.
Focused reorientation
With this focused reorientation on the areas of knowledge and technology transfer, research and continuing education, the Institute believes that it enjoys an excellent position. Professor Stefan Güldenberg, holder of the Chair for International Management, will in future be responsible for the Institute’s continuing education, such as the development of the MBA programmes, with the able assistance of Dr Christian Schimmelpfennig as manager of the university’s continuing education programme. The department of knowledge and technology transfer will now be headed by Professor Christian Marxt, holder of the Chair for Technology and Entrepreneurship, whose area of responsibilities will thus in future also include the SME Centre Affiliated Institute administered by Thomas Moll – the point of contact for would-be company founders at the University of Liechtenstein. The third department, Research, will be headed by the new Head of the Institute and holder of the Chair for Strategic Management and Entrepreneurship in person. As a member of the Top 20 of all business management experts in German-speaking countries – according to the current rankings of the biggest German economic journal Handelsblatt – he is one of the best qualified researchers in his subject area to be found anywhere in the world.
Teaching as a mainstay
But in order to remain at the forefront of intellectual development, research and teaching must constantly interlock and draw inspiration from one another. This is something that the new Head of the Institute explicitly emphasises: ‘The mainstay of the Institute for Entrepreneurship is and will always be teaching. Based on the high ranking we assign to it, therefore, all three professors at the Institute assume an equal amount of responsibility: Güldenberg on the Bachelor’s degree programme, Marxt and Kraus as academic directors of study for the premium product of the Institute, the top-ranking Master of Science in Entrepreneurship – with Assistant Professor Matthias Filser making an essential contribution to running the programme on the operational level.’
Leading personalities from and for the region
The Institute for Entrepreneurship was founded as long as 10 years ago, by Professor Urs Baldegger, who retired in August. It has always been a pioneer in connection with innovation in German-speaking entrepreneurship theory and education. Now as in the past, Head of the Institute Sascha Kraus is convinced, ‘the Institute for Entrepreneurship offers courses that are in much demand, in consecutive sequence – comprising a Bachelor’s degree, Master’s degree and a doctorate – and so makes a crucial contribution to the formation of future leading personalities from and for the region.’