We at Metropolia want to give our strong input to renew Finnish society and to boost growth. Reform and growth are founded on our phenomenon-based innovation hubs built around socially significant phenomena. The innovation hubs on our campuses in Helsinki, Vantaa and Espoo offer a favourable operating and innovation environment to solve challenges across industries, sectors and technologies.
The world is changing in unpredictable ways, and people and societies face ever tougher challenges. At Metropolia, we have a passion for solving those. We have what it takes to fulfil corporate training needs, create innovations, or tackle any societal problem that requires multidisciplinary expertise and collaboration. We can make a difference not only by coming up with pioneering ideas but also by helping you test them out in practice.
As Finland’s largest university of applied sciences, we connect with a huge number of people, including both students of different ages and the multiple stakeholders of working life. Consequently, we feel a strong sense of responsibility for pushing forward the boundaries of knowledge in Finland, while shaping the future of higher education.
We innovate by actively bringing together experts and expertise from various parts of society: new expertise for the future needs of businesses and society, better services, wellbeing and vitality to regions and a range of opportunities for new research, growth and business.
Innovation hubs provide us with an excellent setting to implement the development goals in UN's 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and to help Finland become a model country of sustainable development.
A people first approach to solutions and the utilisation of data and various technologies play a key role when solving phenomenon-based challenges: different views are linked to each other and at best produce new kinds of solutions.
Answers are sought to many challenges and opportunities, such as:
We are renewing our innovation hubs. The number of phenomenon-based innovation hubs has changed from five to three, and the names of two hubs have changed. The presentations of the innovation hubs' activities will be renewed during the beginning of 2024.
Each of our new campuses will have an operation and innovation platform – Solutions Arena – offering the framework for quick experimentation, testing and piloting and a physical location for new kind of active cooperation between public entities, businesses, organisations and citizens.
The Solutions Arena will also play a key role in speeding up learning. The Arena will host topical seminars relating to various phenomena and new technologies and renew and update phenomenon and technology expertise according to society's needs.
Through innovation hubs and the Solutions Arena, Metropolia will become one of the biggest ecosystems in our society. This will also change our own role and identity as a social reformer: Metropolia will develop into a higher education institution that will have a strong impact on regional and social wellbeing and growth on a wide spectrum.
Anna-Maria Vilkuna
Director, Research and Development
anna-maria.vilkuna [at] metropolia.fi (anna-maria[dot]vilkuna[at]metropolia[dot]fi)
Through our publishing activities, we support the development of society and business life.
Collaborators, students and staff work together in innovation hubs on different platforms