The Silesian University of Technology joins EIT Health

The Silesian University of Technology has joined EIT Health, a leading European public-private partnership for innovation in medicine and healthcare. The partnership opens up new opportunities for the Polish university to foster international collaboration with such innovation centers in Europe as Sorbonne University, GE Healthcare, Karolinska Institute or Philips, also associated with EIT Health. The cooperation will be carried out by the European HealthTech Innovation Centre (EHTIC), launched in 2021, a state-of-the-art R&D centre operating in Zabrze at the Faculty of Biomedical Engineering of the Silesian University of Technology. Equipped with world-class technology, software and highly specialized labs and workshops, the Centre is conducting interdisciplinary research, service, information, training, and promotion activities in the field of healthcare technologies.

EIT Health, part of the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT), a body of the European Union is one of the largest European public-private partnerships in healthcare innovation, with a mission to build an ecosystem that enables the development of healthcare for the future so that European citizens can live longer and healthier lives. The InnoStars cluster, one of the eight geographical areas of EIT Health, covers half of Europe, including Italy, Poland, Hungary, and Portugal, as well as 9 additional countries in Central, Eastern and Southern Europe included in the EIT Regional Innovation Scheme, qualified by the European Innovation Scoreboard as moderate innovators.

Joining EIT Health, the Silesian University of Technology will work towards promoting entrepreneurship, innovation, and education in the domain of healthcare, healthy living, and active ageing in Poland and beyond. – “One of the strategic goals of Silesian University of Technology is to build an ecosystem of innovations in healthcare through the collaboration of leading actors operating in the field of health technologies, and by creating, developing and implementing innovative medical technologies to improve disease prevention, diagnosis and treatment. Joining EIT Health opens additional opportunities to carry out our mission” – said Prof. Marek Gzik, head of European HealthTech Innovation Centre.

“We are thrilled to welcome Silesian University of Technology in the EIT Health network,” said Joanna Broy, Ecosystem Lead for Poland, EIT Health. “As part of this collaboration, we will carry out joint activities to improve healthcare in Poland and Europe, based on the latest technologies and positive impact on society. We look forward to the fruitful outputs of our new partnership.”

EIT Health and Poland – a fruitful relationship

According to the recent EIT Health study called “InnoStars Innovation Index” Poland plays a critical role in the EIT Health strategy. The country’s healthcare start-up ecosystem is emerging as one of the most promising in the region and beyond. It is one of the four countries in the InnoStars region that has a dedicated Ecosystem Lead and a partner network of leading enterprises, universities, and research institutes. Existing EIT Health partners in the country include the Medical University of Łódź, the Medical University of Gdansk, the University of Warsaw, the Łódź University of Technology and the Łukasiewicz Research Network – PORT (Polish Centre for Technology Development).

To date, EIT Health has invested around €4.7 million in boosting innovation in Poland. This leading healthcare innovation network in Europe has also been committed to supporting Polish start-ups: 28 of them have received around €600K worth of financial, mentoring, training, and networking assistance. The support and visibility they obtained allowed them to gain additional funding – for an amount of ca. €20 million – and to attract external partners for their projects.

Dozens of start-up teams have benefited from the financial and networking opportunities provided by EIT Health. One of them is UVera, a company that aims to provide natural, healthy, and safe UV protection solutions with a decrease in negative environmental impact on the planet in the zero-waste process.

Another successful start-up, Brainscan, has developed an AI-powered brain image interpretation solution for digital imaging diagnostics, improving interpretation speed and accuracy. Meanwhile, REMMEDVR is making waves with its VR technology that provides remote vision therapy, while UnitDoseOne aims at revolutionizing drug preparation with its robotized device that automatically creates individual doses for patients.