Changes

IE University has been very engaged with both big and small industry players from its foundation. Both master and undergrad students engage with businesses from the start of their programs. Freshers and sophomores are part of the IE Labs, which act as consulting laboratories where they can work first hand with real-world cases. Companies collaborate due to their great interest in out-of-the-box thinking young students can offer to their companies. For instance, 2017’s Tech Lab for master students was sponsored by IBM and mentored students to solve an internal case. In the following years, students have mandatory internships that enrich both their personal careers and the industry. Therefore, when IE students graduate they have a clear picture of the industry’s options and can decide where to kickstart their career path. Regarding the entrepreneurship landscape, IE has developed various initiatives in the past years where businesses either fund, mentor or inspire students that want to develop their own projects. Examples of these are the Repsol Foundation Entrepreneurs Fund or the IE Rockets, which acts as an incubator for education startups.

The School places a marked emphasis on unconventional approaches to enduring social problems, many undertaken jointly with key players in the field of process design, creativity, social entrepreneurship and innovation. Current collaborations at IE include partners such as The Hub Madrid, Net Impact and Emzingo to name a few.