"Demola Latvia" is a cooperation platform between students, companies and universities. It gives students the opportunity to work in interdisciplinary teams in a real business environment. In turn, it is an opportunity for companies to bring new competencies and ideas to the company without high financial risk, to establish contacts with motivated, talented students, as well as to obtain an innovative and implementable solution. "Demola Latvia" is implemented by Riga Technical University (RTU) in cooperation with the University of Latvia (LU), but students of other universities can also participate in it.
Experienced mentors, experts and team leaders work with students during problem research and solution development, and teams receive up to 2,500 euros in funding to validate and prototype ideas.
In the Fall season, companies offered challenges in a very wide range of industries and topics. They involved research and development of IT and various technical solutions, as well as marketing and even textile recycling. The student teams also looked for the best ways to improve mobility at the Children's Clinical University Hospital, develop tools to motivate children and adolescents with injuries, overweight, oncological diseases or limited mobility to move more, and developed ideas to improve access to different groups of passengers in Čiekurkalna railway station.
"Sadales tīkls", "Mitau Prefab", "Valmiermuižas alus", "Torena Investīcijas", "MoIPort" and "State Real Estate" offered their challenges to student teams. The company "Mikrotīkls" supported five challenges and teams this season. They were related to the Children's Clinical University Hospital, the Latvian HPC Competence Center SuperS and the smart city innovation space "VEFRESH".
After the final presentations, the student teams will present their solutions in more detail to the companies who will by the end of January decide whether to purchase the solutions.
"Demola Latvia" is a part of the ERDF co-financed project "Innovation Grants for Students" (No.1.1.1.3/18/A/001 "RTU Innovation Grants for Students" and No.1.1.1.3/18/A/007 "LU Innovation Grants students'').