Keio UniversityOffice of Innovationand Entrepreneurship

What is the “innovation” in our office’s name? For companies, innovation may refer to the creation of new services and products. But for universities, innovation is the process of finding real-world applications for researchers’ work to improve people’s lives—the end result being ingenuity that benefits many. A university is a place where bright and talented young people can get together and engage on a deep level with experts who are leaders in advanced disciplines of learning. In due time, these young people will become the leaders of the next generation with the ability to change organizations and make a lasting impact on society. The Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship utilizes academia’s strengths while serving as an organization to create a pro-innovation environment around the world. And at the root of that is the spirit of Keio University founder Yukichi Fukuzawa’s philosophy “kyuko jissen“, or acting on one’s principles.

The Keio University Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship has three divisions that implement social applications from the university’s research findings: the Open Innovation Division, the Startup Division, and the Intellectual Property Division. By creating startups to commercialize research findings and conducting major joint research with companies based on the findings, the university can obtain compensation and revenue from intellectual property. With these funds, we can reinvest in further research and educational programs to create new technologies with more real-world applications. This cycle is the innovation ecosystem,the goal of the Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship. Just as researchers who devote their lives to studying one subject, we will stimulate the ecosystem and overcome social issues with passion and a business mindset.

The Keio University Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship provides wide-ranging support through collaboration between its divisions to link university academics and research findings with real-world applications. We support the creation of intellectual property from research findings and promote the commercialization of these research findings through industry-academia partnerships and startup incubation. We will also work with internal and external stakeholders to promote entrepreneurship-centered education to foster the development of entrepreneurial and business talent. Keio University aims to contribute to a more sustainable future society by stimulating an innovation ecosystem through the commercialization of innovative ideas and research findings at the university to create new values with the goal of solving social issues.