Where in Zuidas
Don’t be deceived by the light, blue-green colour of the containers in the middle of the VU campus: people are hard at work here. Since September 2022, this has been home to the VU StartHub which was built from refurbished construction units and features a green roof, waterless urinals and a beehive. This pavilion has space for up to 25 start-ups. Students, staff, PhD candidates and alumni can hire a regular office or workplace here in order to transform their ideas into successful businesses. With superfast internet, friendly rents and the company of around 70 VU alumni, it’s the ideal place for academically-trained entrepreneurs who are reaching for the stars.
Entrepreneurs speak out
The energetic Tanja van der Knoop is an example of one of them. Aged 63, and with a career in business behind her, she is not the kind of person you would immediately associate with a start-up. But she actually is: with a young business partner (a VU alumnus), and a team that brings together people of different ages and from different disciplines, she’s working to make areas and buildings greener. ‘Although the focus is often on innovation, the priority for our start-up is to work towards a slightly better world.’ This is a mission that is often heard here in the VU StartHub. But it is not the only thing that brings together these entrepreneurs, who can spend three years here before making way for the next entrepreneur in-the-making. ‘Although every start-up is unique, we’re all at the same phase in our entrepreneurship journey’, says Leroy Ranglek, the 24-year-old co-founder of a start-up that produces toilet paper from bamboo. ‘Most of us don’t have much experience of business yet, so we may take slightly more risks.’ This possibly explains why VU StartHub, at the heart of the VU campus, has an atmosphere that suggests unlimited possibilities.
An entrepreneurial factory of ideas
Every day, the VU students in the Innovation District, an environment where entrepreneurship is never far away, are challenged to come up with innovative solutions that have a social impact. The VU, where around 30,000 students are now sharpening up their knowledge and skills, is not only full of ideas, but also packed with entrepreneurial spirit. ‘Entrepreneurship is in the VU Amsterdam DNA’, says President of the Executive Board and Professor of Entrepreneurship Mirjam van Praag, who, with the Director of the VU StartHub Hans Drenth, is the driving force behind the initiative. ‘Studies have shown that entrepreneurship is not only a skill that people are born with, but one that can largely be learnt.’
Like-minded people
There are always challenges and practical obstacles between an idea and a successful company. The VU StartHub can provide a real helping hand in that phase. But, by then, the aspiring entrepreneurs will already have honed their idea in the Demonstrator Lab and gone through a strict selection process at one of the many pitch meetings. After becoming members of the VU StartHub, they suddenly have a business address, a modern workplace and, perhaps most importantly: they are part of a community of like-minded people. Hans Drenth puts it like this: ‘It’s great to see that the start-ups all have a specific purpose in mind: there’s a challenge in society and they aim to come up with a solution for it.’
The Innovation District
In the years ahead, we are working with VU and Amsterdam UMC to transform the Innovation District in Zuidas into an exciting mixture that brings together a wide variety of different functions. In this neighbourhood (on the south side of the A10, between Parnassusweg/Buitenveldertselaan, A.J. Ernststraat and Amstelveenseweg), there will be around 2,700 homes alongside space for education and knowledge-related business, healthcare, culture, shops and hospitality. Boasting the new ADORE Research and Diagnostics Centre, the Rialto VU cinema and the new Stepstone social housing project, the Innovation District is set to become a place where housing, interaction, inspiration and knowledge-sharing come together.
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