Innovation Booster Future Urban Society

What does the future of life look like in urban areas in Switzerland?

How does the good life work within planetary limits? How can we live in a climate-friendly way in the future? How can we travel affordably, climate-neutrally — privately and professionally? How do we make it possible for everyone to eat as regionally and environmentally friendly as possible? These questions can only be answered together, co-creatively and with a new understanding of innovation.

The Innovation Booster Future Urban Society promotes radically new approaches to catapult the best ideas in the interconnected areas of housing, mobility and nutrition out of their niche. Bring along your solutions and develop them further with other experts and innovators. Help mainstream eco-social innovations and secure yourself and your team for jointly developed ideas of up to CHF 25,000.

More about the basic idea of Innosuisse's Innovation Booster

Selected projects

From 45 ideas, 10 were selected and these are now being supported in our Innovation Booster.

Climate-just housing in urban areas

Wohnungsbau schlau etappieren

Urban Equipe
ZHAW

Wo Wohnhäuser saniert werden, verlieren 94% der Mieter:innen ihr Zuhause, bei Ersatzneubauten noch mehr. Angesichts der aktuellen Wohn- und Klimakrise müssen wir dringend lernen, unsere Häuser so um- und weiterzubauen, dass ihre Bewohnerschaft wohnen bleiben kann. Eine wichtige Strategie dabei ist die Etappierung von Bauprojekten. Worauf es dabei ankommt erforschen wir anhand von Good Practices und verbreiten die Erkenntnisse so, dass sie Planer:innen und Eigentümer:innen finden und direkt anwenden können.

Zum Projekt
Circulation of things

ERZ Smart Assistant – Kreislaufwirtschaft einfach & attraktiv

Liip | ERZ
ZHAW

Kreislaufwirtschaft, Recycling und Entsorgung sind komplex und erfordern einen hohen Wissensstand seitens der Bevölkerung. Der ERZ Smart Assistant nutzt Fortschritte in Bilderkennung und Künstlicher Intelligenz (KI), um Gegenstände mit dem Smartphone zu identifizieren und den idealen Kreislaufprozess aus dem vernetzten Ökosystem vorzuschlagen: Weitergeben, Tauschen, Reparieren, Verkaufen, Recyceln u.v.m

Zum Projekt
Circulation of things

Züri Teilt

Verein Pumpipumpe
FHNW

«Züri teilt» fördert das Teilen und die soziale Interaktion unter Zürcher*innen. Mit einer Mobile-App können Bewohner*innen in der Wohnnähe für einen benötigten Gegenstand angefragt werden und einen Übergabetermin vereinbaren.

Zum Projekt

Alle Ideen Entdecken

Events

The following events and workshops still await us during the next couple of months:

Momentan sind keine Events geplant.

Calls

As a national program with a regional character, we work closely with various cities and municipalities. For 2024, together with the City of Zurich, we have IG Klimagenossenschaft and Atelier «Lebenswerte Quartiere» as part of the BKW Initiative «Lebensräume 2025» identified two challenges:

Past open calls

Einreiche-Phase

Einreichefrist:

8/9/24

Startdatum:

May 6, 2024

Circulation of things

How could we encourage the general public to reuse or to pass on things rather than disposing of them or buying new ones by "strengthening" the existing, promising initiatives, services and offers for sharing, passing on and repairing?

Mehr erfahren

Einreiche-Phase

Einreichefrist:

8/9/24

Startdatum:

May 7, 2024

Climate-just housing in urban areas

How is climate-just housing possible in urban areas? We are looking for promising existing approaches and new ideas that can be realised quickly, are accessible to many people and affordable. These should be strengthened and multiplied in their effectiveness.

Mehr erfahren

We need systemic approaches

Climate crisis, destruction of biodiversity, energy crisis — we live in a world of multiple crises. Mastering these challenges requires radically new ideas and approaches, both technologically and socially.

Whether sharing, repair or DIY — many innovative approaches, projects and ideas for climate-friendly living in urban areas remain small. Not because they don't work in principle, but because they usually affect different areas of our lives, because it is not easy to change our habits and a wide variety of actors have to participate in implementing them. The perpetuation or dissemination of integrative approaches works differently than with purely commercial offerings. In our Innovation Booster, we therefore want to strengthen and scale eco-social innovations in order to establish them in the mainstream.

“What concerns everyone, only everyone can solve.” Friedrich Dürrenmatt (The Physicists)

The major challenges of our time can only be overcome by working together with people from different sectors of society. That is why the booster uses an open innovation approach. Over the next four years, we will bring together key actors from civil society, science and business with city administrations, currently from Zurich, Basel and Lausanne. Together, systemic problems are researched and radical ideas for sustainable solutions are developed.

Be part of the solution and receive up to CHF 25,000

To enable and accelerate innovation, we connect cities and administrations with eco-social innovators as well as stakeholders from the private sector and science. We can financially support ideas that arise and/or are developed through the Innovation Booster Program with up to CHF 25,000, including vouchers for expert advice and coaching. In this way, we make it possible for promising innovations to be further developed and tested in urban areas of Switzerland. In addition, together with our partners, we are working to ensure that further implementation of the innovations after the booster is likely.

Die erste Einreiche-Phase ist vorbei und es können zurzeit keine weiteren Projekte eingegeben werden.

Stay informed

Who is behind the project?

Meso Innovation Alliance
The Booster Future Urban Society is supported by Meso as a Co-Leading House and is characterized by the expertise of the following organizations:

Team

Björn Müller
Björn Müller
Programme Director | Meso Innovationsallianz / Stride the unSchool
Samuel Eberenz
Samuel Eberenz
Konzeption & Stakeholder engagement | Stiftung Risiko-Dialog / Meso Innovationsallianz
Mirko Fischli
Mirko Fischli
Project Manager Booster | Dezentrum / Meso Innovationsallianz
Katrin Hauser
Katrin Hauser
Konzeption & Facilitation | Scaling4Good / Meso Innovationsallianz
Nicola Blum
Nicola Blum
Konzeption & Research | BFH
Pascal Dey
Pascal Dey
Research | BFH
Sarah Bleuler
Sarah Bleuler
Project Manager & Kommunikation | Dezentrum
Yann Bartal
Yann Bartal
Kommunikation | Dezentrum

City Partnerships

Urban innovation is only possible through strong partnerships with cities and municipalities. That is why we are particularly proud of our implementation partnerships:

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