AI Factory Austria AI:AT attended this year’s ESI Demo Day at the Vienna University of Technology as a member of the jury.
The Innovation Incubation Center (i²c) at TU Wien brought together students, founders, investors, industry representatives, and innovation stakeholders to present the projects of the current ESI cohort.
© TU Wien Innovation Incubation Center, Oana Ianovici
The Extended Study on Innovation (ESI) is a one-year, English-language entrepreneurship program at TU Wien that guides selected master’s students on their journey from the initial idea to the development of marketable solutions. Over the course of two semesters, participants go through the entire innovation process—from identifying a problem to validating their business idea and developing prototypes, all the way to building partnerships, securing funding, and preparing for market entry. About half of the ESI projects go on to become startups, underscoring the program’s lasting impact.
The annual Demo Day is the centerpiece of the program, where teams present their projects to a jury. Beyond the Pitch Challenge, the event creates opportunities for students, startups, researchers, industry representatives, and investors to connect and exchange ideas, highlighting the value of interdisciplinary collaboration for Austria’s innovation ecosystem.
At this year’s Demo Day, the teams presented an impressive range of innovative solutions. It was particularly encouraging to see so many projects in which artificial intelligence plays a central role and new approaches have been developed to address challenges in a wide variety of application areas.
© TU Wien Innovation Incubation Center, Oana Ianovici
Jan Pilsinger (AI Enablement Lead at AI:AT) attended the event as a jury member on behalf of AI Factory Austria and evaluated the projects together with Caroline Klinger(ProSiebenSat.1 PULS 4 ), Birgit Polster (Erste Bank) und Sophia Lang (aws). The interdisciplinary jury, representing business, media, finance, and innovation support, provided the teams with valuable feedback and perspectives to help further develop their ideas.
Two AI-related teams – Resolved and PlayCoach were awarded a coworking space at the AI Factory Austria Hub. The award gives both teams the opportunity to further develop their solutions in an innovation-driven environment while fostering collaboration with experts and fellow startups.
The ESI Demo Day at TU Wien highlighted the value of collaboration between universities, research institutions, companies, and public innovation partners. AI Factory Austria is pleased to continue supporting initiatives that bring research closer to practical business applications and help advance the next generation of AI solutions in Austria and Europe.
