Explore the Circle U. InCU.bator in action
The InCU.bator is an arena for challenge-based learning and support for students to develop innovation skills and entrepreneurship projects. The InCU.bator fosters collective learning opportunities, in collaboration with associate partners, and public, private and civic actors. It offers a range of challenge-based and co-creative formats, including hackathons, games, etc., in authentic work-life relevant settings where students take centre stage in the social innovation process.
The Circle U. Women Founders Network
– an open community for a bold future
We, the Circle U. Women Founders Network, believe in the transformative power of inclusivity and intercultural understanding. We foster open-mindedness and empathy within a vibrant, creative, and engaging community, where diverse perspectives unite to inspire and empower young women innovators.
Our main goal is to support cultural change in entrepreneurship by
- Creating opportunities for everyone to reach substantial equality for young innovators
- Exchanging and creating a space for sharing resources and ideas
- Providing support, knowledge, and skills to empower young women on their entrepreneurial journey.
Latest on the InCU.bator
International Women’s Day: Empowering the Next Generation of European Founders
WFN "From Potential to Power" Spring Track 2026
Academic matchmaking: Co-creating joint courses for Circle U.
The Cross-InCU.bation Week 2026
Open Conversation: Is the Funding System Holding Women Entrepreneurs Back?
Watch the In.CU.bator's Open Conversations
Open Conversations are hybrid conferences addressing global challenges through an interdisciplinary perspective. Those events are open to students, academics, staff, and the public outside of Circle U.
Offers
Summer School "From Potential to Power"
Tenuta Lab: Social Innovation Bootcamp
Sustainable Agritourism Intensive Week (SAIW)
Summer School: "Venture Creation - making purposeful ideas reality"
Cross-InCUbation week
Entrepreneurial Change-making
Meet the team
Merethe Kruse
- Academic Coordinator
- Aarhus University
Merethe Kruse
- Academic Coordinator
- Aarhus University
Merethe Kruse is Head of the Circle U. InCU.bator and works in The Kitchen at Aarhus University. The Kitchen is part of Enterprise and Innovation. For 20 +years Merethe has worked with bridging the gap between academia and entrepreneurship in further education. She has long experience from leading student incubators as well as a career centre and has been in charge of various challenges as well as a large interdisciplinary case competition, where students engaged in real-life challenges posed by enterprises and societal stakeholders. Student engagement and student driven initiatives is at the core of Merethe’s focus, she lectures in sustainable innovation and is a specialist in sustainable business development.
Profile page and contact details
Alessandra Meoni
- InCU.bator Co-coordinator
- Profile page and contact details
Alessandra Meoni
- InCU.bator Co-coordinator
- Profile page and contact details
Educational Content Project Officer within Circle U., Alessandra Meoni co-coordinates Work Package 5 on Societal Engagement across the alliance. With ten years’ experience as a lecturer at the University of Pisa, she brings an academic background in philosophy and literature into the design and development of innovative learning content. At the InCU.bator Alessandra acts as a bridge between strategy and practice, translating ideas into engaging educational formats and fostering collaboration across disciplines, institutions, and communities.
Profile page and contact details
Academic Chairs
Dr. Markus Bugge
- Academic Chair
- University of Oslo
Dr. Markus Bugge
- Academic Chair
- University of Oslo
Markus M. Bugge is Associate Professor and Head of Education at the TIK Centre for Technology, Innovation and Culture at the University of Oslo. He is also senior researcher at NIFU Nordic Institute for Studies in Innovation, Research and Education. He holds a PhD from the Department of Social and Economic Geography at Uppsala University and has extensive experience from research on innovation and innovation policies across private and public domains. Current interests include governance of sustainability transitions and digitalization, as well as exploring how students can engage in real-life challenges posed by societal stakeholders.
Profile page and contact details
TIK Centre for Technology, Innovation and Culture
University of Oslo
Prof. Alessio Cavicchi
- Academic Chair
- University of Pisa
Prof. Alessio Cavicchi
- Academic Chair
- University of Pisa
His research activity focuses on the analysis of consumers’ choice on local and quality products, of sustainable tourism and of innovation processes in the agri-food sector and in rural areas.
He published more than 200 papers and chapters in national and international journals and books. He is co-editor of the Book Series “Consumer Science and Strategic Marketing” published by Elsevier.
He has been coordinator and partner of several European projects Horizon, Erasmus+ Knowledge Alliances and Strategic Partnerships on the collaboration between universities, business and territory.
He has been an invited speaker and external expert for the Italian Ministry of University and Research, the World Tourism Organization and the European Commission (specifically Joint Research Center, DG Regio, DG Education and Culture, DG Agri e DG RTD) on topics concerning innovation of agri-food and rural areas and the collaboration between universities and territorial stakeholders.
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Full Professor in Agribusiness, Rural Development and Branding – Rector’s Delegate for the Promotion of Entrepreneurial Culture and Innovation
Department of Agriculture, Food and Environment
University of Pisa
Prof. Dr. Vesna Damnjanovic
- Academic Chair
- University of Belgrade
Prof. Dr. Vesna Damnjanovic
- Academic Chair
- University of Belgrade
Vesna Damnjanovic is the Founder and Managing Director of the Belgrade Business International Case Competition among the top 10 case competitions in the world. Vesna had visited 47 countries and was the mentor of many winning student's teams at global case competitions, including innovations in sustainability and business. She is expert for Case Solving Innovative Teaching Methodology.
Profile page and contact details
Faculty of Organizational Sciences
University of Belgrade
Dr. Morten Foss
- Academic Chair
- Aarhus University
Dr. Morten Foss
- Academic Chair
- Aarhus University
Dr. Foss received his PhD in 1994, after which he worked 7 years in industry. Now he heads a research group at iNANO containing strong interdisciplinary competences focusing on surfaces/interfaces related to biomedical applications. Morten Foss has published 78 articles (H-index of 31) and has his name on 8 patents.
Profile page and contact details
Faculty of Natural Sciences
Aarhus University
Prof. Dusko Ilic
- Academic Chair
- King's College London
Prof. Dusko Ilic
- Academic Chair
- King's College London
Dusko Ilic graduated Medical School and Molecular Biology in Belgrade, Serbia, and obtained Ph.D. at the University of Tokyo, Japan. The focus of his work is translational aspects of human reproduction, stem cell research, and development of sustainable technologies. He is technical co-founder and advisor to VitroLabs.
Profile page and contact details
Faculty of Life Sciences and Medicine
King's College London
Prof. Dr. Amélie Jacquemin
- Academic Chair
- UCLouvain
Prof. Dr. Amélie Jacquemin
- Academic Chair
- UCLouvain
Amélie Jacquemin is Associate Professor of entrepreneurship at the Louvain School of Management (UCLouvain) and academic head of the incubator for student entrepreneurial projects on the UCLouvain FUCaM Mons campus. She holds a master's degree in law and a Ph.D. in management sciences. Before joining the academic sphere, she worked in the private sector (the Brussels bar as a business lawyer) and the public one (within a political party as an advisor). Attached to the Louvain Research Institute in Management and Organizations, her work focuses on entrepreneurship and SMEs, and more specifically on entrepreneurial action and education.
Profile page and contact details
Louvain School of Management
Université Catholique de Louvain
Prof. Nicolas Loménie
- Academic Chair
- Université Paris Cité
Prof. Nicolas Loménie
- Academic Chair
- Université Paris Cité
Dr. Nicolas Loménie, PhD., Eng., is a teacher-researcher in Artificial Intelligence and Computer Vision. He is particularly interested in computational pathology lately. He is a member of LIPADE, the applied computer science laboratory of the University of Paris, and of the newly created Data Intelligent Institute of Paris (DIIP). He is an alumni of the Entrepreneur First program at Station F and is currently the project manager for student entrepreneurship, which manages the national status of the same name. For example, he participated in 2021 in the first competition combining research and entrepreneurship, the Zeugma competition, which brings together all the students around Paris area.
Profile page and contact details
Université Paris Cité
Dr. Marco Masia
- Academic Chair
- University of Vienna
Dr. Marco Masia
- Academic Chair
- University of Vienna
Expert of Academic Entrepreneurship, Marco Masia oversees the spin-off support and the entrepreneurial education programmes at the University of Vienna. He is also member of the investment advisory board of the Vienna technology incubator (INiTS) and serves as Academic Chair for innovation at the European University Initiative alliance Circle-U. For more than a decade, Marco has covered different roles at the intersection between research, innovation, and policy: executive coordinator of the Initiative for Science in Europe, founder and managing director of a consultancy company (MARMAS GmbH), assistant professor of theoretical chemistry at the University of Sassari. He holds a PhD in Physics (Polytechnic University of Catalonia, Spain), a MSc in Chemistry (University of Sassari, Italy) and an executive MBA (Frankfurt School for Finance & Management, Germany).
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Head of Entrepreneurship
Research services
University of Vienna
Dr. Veljko Mijušković
- Academic Chair
- University of Belgrade
Dr. Veljko Mijušković
- Academic Chair
- University of Belgrade
Assistant professor at the Faculty of Economics, Belgrade University. Primary areas of professional interest are: supply chain management, logistics management and strategic management. Author of three monographs, coauthor of one secondary school textbook and two university textbooks, as well as more than 80 published papers. Fluent in English, Spanish, French.
Profile page and contact details
Faculty of Economics
University of Belgrade
