Free Hanseatic City of Bremen

The science and innovation systems in the state of Bremen are closely connected. The research activities of the universities and numerous non-university research institutions can mainly be identified in the eight research and transfer priorities of the state. The state of Bremen is pursuing a two-track policy in this regard, with its basis in the Science Plan 2025: On the one hand, as the home of a cluster of excellence, Bremen is also seeking to become the site of a university of excellence once again and therefore focuses strongly on fostering outstanding basic research and international visibility. On the other hand, Bremen emphasises the performance dimension of knowledge transfer through its very good transfer capacity and ability to collaborate with the private sector as a result of outstanding applied research and/or through its very good capacity for transfer to civil society, politics and administration.

The transfer capacity of the science system is particularly evident in terms of its importance for the innovation culture of the state. The Innovation Strategy 2030 provides the framework for innovation and technology funding in the state of Bremen and identifies five key innovation fields that contribute to meeting societal challenges. The state’s research institutions and universities contribute significantly to innovations in these areas and are often drivers of technology development. The state is striving to integrate the research and transfer priorities named in the Science Plan 2025 even more closely with the key industries in the state. These include aerospace, logistics, the health industry and the renewable energy industry, more specifically wind energy.

The clusters and networks in the various key sectors are important instruments for bringing business and science together and for initiating and advancing innovations in these areas. The state therefore actively promotes these clusters and networks and identifies new fields where there is sufficient scale to form a cluster, for instance through a future food hub in the food and luxury food industry and a health campus in the health sciences.

On the part of universities and research institutions, there is an intrinsic motivation to bring research results into application. Translation takes place, for instance, in the form of technology transfer and knowledge transfer into policy and civil society, as well as by providing information to the interested public, sometimes in unconventional formats for different target groups.

International cooperation is an important part of the state’s science and innovation system. The universities and research institutions maintain strategic cooperative relationships, also on an international level, with individual universities, university alliances and international research institutions. These collaborations aim to advance the development of the research and transfer priorities and give them even greater international visibility. There are also international research collaborations with companies, for example in aerospace and the energy sciences. Bremen is thus pursuing the goal of making research and innovation ‘made in Bremen’ even better known on an international playing field.