The “Gründungsfabrik Rheingau” was officially launched on March 1, 2020. The joint project of the two partners Hochschule Geisenheim University and EBS University of Economics and Law, funded by the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy (BMWi) through the EXIST program, aims at raising awareness, qualifying, motivating and bringing together members from both universities who are interested in founding a company.

We have chosen the historic building of the “Waas.schen Fabrik” (link to the website Waas.schen Fabrik) in Geisenheim as our home where we set up offices, co-working spaces and a workshop room in the first year. Corona didn’t make it easy for us, but we broke new ground for networking and transformed our programs and events into hybrid as well as digital formats.

In the first year, we carried out 85 start-up consultations and organized first events, such as the Innovation Challenge and the Founder Program “From Business Idea to Business Plan” with over 40 participants. As part of the Founders’ Week Germany in November, we also launched our “Gründungsfabrik Brunch” networking event, which take place every eight weeks. In addition, the first round of the Rheingau Founders’ Award (“Rheingauer Gründungspreis”) was announced and the award ceremony for the nine winners took place digitally in December. We are also particularly proud of two of our founding teams who have received funding from the EXIST scholarship in this first year.

Looking back on our first year, we are proud to say: we have gained a lot of valuable experience in various areas and have developed great ideas for the years to come.

We kick off our 2nd year with a range of great offers provided free of charge:

– On March 10, 2021, we launch our lecture series: All university members who are interested in setting up their own business are invited to join the event. The lectures take place every other week and discuss subject-related topics.  

– The next founders’ program entitled “From Business Idea to Business Plan” takes place on March 19, 2021: Founders from both universities are invited to apply and participate.

Gründungsfabrik Rheingau, where your idea starts!