News

Reimagine the future of medicine: Junior Achievement to boost digital health and innovation through entrepreneurial hubs

Junior Achievement is embarking on a collaborative project with Novartis in Europe to be piloted in Central and Eastern Europe, aimed at leveraging technology and “start-up” thinking in the medical field. By establishing a series of pre-accelerator hubs in digital health and innovation, the program will generate a stronger ecosystem of innovators who will work to reimagine medicine as we know it.

One of the defining features of the future will be closer collaboration across sectors that have traditionally existed in separate and limited silos, and scaling-up local initiatives to regional and global level. Tremendous potential for innovation and progress awaits those who master the ability to work in a network-centric fashion, and we intend to lead the way.

We will pursue our aims by first carrying out a comprehensive ecosystem mapping initiatives to discover and align the key players of our mission; working on mindset and cultural change within all partner organizations to stimulate open innovation; and finally, work to scale our efforts at the European level. JA and local Novartis offices from the following countries participate in the project: Bulgaria, Serbia, Croatia, Cyprus, Malta, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia.

The project will kick off with a pilot in Serbia, where we will test the ground and prototype our ideas, including the adaptation and implementation of a successful pre-accelerator programme from JA Bulgaria. We intend to communicate the developments of our initiative in real time, so keep an eye out for more news from us in the near future by visiting the project website.

“The current context has highlighted the need to accelerate innovation and entrepreneurship in the health sector, to find timely solutions to the challenges we face”, said Salvatore Nigro, CEO JA Europe. “Junior Achievement is thankful to Novartis for leading the way and believing in the need to invest in the skills and opportunities of the next generation of Europeans”, he added.

About JA Europe

JA Europe is the largest non-profit in Europe dedicated to preparing young people for employment and entrepreneurship. JA Europe is a member of JA Worldwide, which for 100 years has delivered hands on, experiential learning in entrepreneurship, work readiness and financial literacy. JA creates pathways for employability, job creation and financial success. Last school year, the JA network in Europe reached more than 4 million young people across 40 countries with the support of 140,000 business volunteers and 130,000 teachers/educators.

Contact

JA Europe: Minna MELLERI, minna@jaeurope.org