Dr. David A. Schmidt, President of the American University in Dubai, and Dr. Riccardo Roggeri, CEO of Techinnova S.p.A., – an Italian innovative startup incubator, certified by the Italian Ministry of Economic Development and a professional investor, signed a Memorandum of Understanding. The MOU will support startups emerging from within AUD’s Entrepreneurship and Innovation Center (AEIC) Incubator, certified by the Hamdan Innovation Incubator in Dubai. Techinnova will also collaborate on research emerging from AUD’s Schools of Engineering, Business, and Architecture, Art and Design, under the Office of the Provost.

The signing was attended by Dr. Sabrina Joseph, Provost and Chief Academic Officer; Ms. Clara Bernasco, Co-Founder and CEO of RIC 3D, Dr. Sunita Kshatriya, Entrepreneurship & Innovation Center Manager and Associate Professor of Management and, founders and co-founders of 10 AEIC startups.

The AEIC Incubator will facilitate the soft landing of Techinnova startups and support Techinnova on logistics, space, licensing, partnership collaboration and acquisition. It will also arrange mentoring and networking to fund various stages of startup development such as prototyping and building of minimum viable features, market validation, piloting and market introduction.

Techinnova will not only support with equity, for 10 AEIC Incubator startups whose ideas are aligned with their startups’ in various fields of Agriculture, Technology, e-Commerce, Artificial Intelligence, MedTech etc., from Fall 21 through crowd funding, but will also mentor them through market validation, piloting and introduction in the next three years at the local, regional and global levels.

AUD’s Incubator with Techinnova, will develop a phase investment plan for its current 10 Startups that include Solaris Solutions, Portreat Art Gallery, Acadlinks, eChain Solar Homes, Food Waste to Fertilizer, Wathaeq - Smart Doc App, Food Optimization, Paolita - Mother-Daughter Brand, Hey Valet and Shadow Job.

Techinnova hopes to support these startups in the local, regional and global markets through mutual collaboration on mentoring and the exchange of skills and competencies between the two incubators. It will also provide collaborative support to startups across its global network to enhance their technological, industrial, and commercial potential in the startup eco-system.