Tech 2030: Resilience, innovation and solutions to the challenges of the future

Time is running out for Tech Strategy 2025, and we’re busy further developing the direction of the faculty. The Faculty Management is in agreement that we should continue to be known for our collaborative mindset and as a faculty that creates impact and presents solutions to the great challenges of our time through our educational, consultancy and research activities. Because that ambition has proved quite successful.

“We’ve succeeded in building our faculty on the basis of excellent departments and a strong academic foundation in the environmental, food, agricultural and engineering fields. In the next strategy period, we must keep up the good work – while respectfully acknowledging that we’re incredibly busy round and about, and that we also need to focus on the robustness and organisational sustainability of our faculty after several years of marked growth across most of our academic fields.”

Tech’s position is unique

Both the Draghi report and, most recently, Ursula von der Leyen have emphasised the need to strengthen European competitiveness at a time when global political dynamics are shifting. And that realisation will shape the direction of Tech 2030.

“We need to strengthen European sovereignty in the face of current geopolitical developments, but we also need to build resilience and sustainable solutions to the various crises facing the world in areas such as climate, water, energy, food and health. There’s a great need for creating more incremental and radical innovation in order to transform our knowledge into new solutions that ultimately make us more resilient. In fact, Tech is in a unique position given the core fields of expertise we build on,” says Eskild Holm Nielsen and adds:

“I expect the universities to contribute to a much greater extent to addressing major societal challenges through our mission-driven research, among other things. At Tech, I’ve seen plenty of evidence of our mission-driven researchers working incredibly hard to create impact in society. We need to further develop these capabilities towards 2030.”

Involvement through focus groups

AU’s new 2030 strategy has just been approved by the board. At the same time, four focus groups with representatives from all Tech department, DCE and DCA are working to provide input on the direction of Tech in the coming years.

“The focus groups reflect the breadth of our academic expertise, and their input will play an important role in shaping the final direction of Tech 2030. They contribute a broad spectrum of ideas to our work and ensure that we get to shine a light on and discuss how working with resilience, innovation and a mission-driven mindset can contribute to the implementation of our four focal points,” says Eskild Holm Nielsen.

The focus groups take as their starting point the four focal points from Tech’s current strategy, which will thus be carried over into the Tech of the future:

“Our focal points have been right, and as the educational landscape in Denmark and the geopolitical situation have changed and continue to change, they have taken on even greater importance. For example, it is more important than ever to meet our students at eye level in order to retain them in a situation where the competition to attract students is intensifying as a result of various educational reforms,” says Eskild Holm Nielsen and continues:

“A strong collaborative culture is another focal point for Tech, and collaboration will still be key to fulfilling our mission and finding answers to the major challenges facing society. Our activities have earned us great recognition both nationally and internationally, and we need to maintain and further develop this position. We need to make sure we’re always relevant to the future we’re heading towards.”