Results at a glance
- Seal of Excellence awarded by the European Commission to the alliance’s European Universities proposal, June 2024.
- Recognition as a European University in 2025, as published by Hochschule Bielefeld, the coordinating institution.
- Ten member institutions from nine countries since January 2026.
- Two projects funded through the EIT Higher Education Initiative: DigiCare Innovation (2025–2027) and THRIVE (2026–2028).
- Three free online courses in digital health and entrepreneurship, one of them worth 2 ECTS.
- Blended Intensive Programmes in 2026, including 23 participants in Dual-Use in Medicine and 28 staff participants in Research Management.
Recognition and growth
DigiCare Innovation: Empowering community care through digital health
DigiCare Innovation is funded by the European Union through the EIT Higher Education Initiative (EIT HEI), supported by EIT Health and coordinated by EIT RawMaterials. Hochschule Bielefeld leads the project. It runs from April 2025 to April 2027: Phase 1 from April to December 2025, Phase 2a from January to December 2026 and Phase 2b from January to April 2027.
The project aims at “transforming higher education institutions (HEIs) into engines of innovation and entrepreneurship to address critical challenges in community healthcare”, with a focus on oncology, mental health and chronic disease management, through digital health technologies, IoT-based testing platforms and entrepreneurial ecosystems.
Consortium
- Hochschule Bielefeld University of Applied Sciences and Arts, Germany (coordinator)
- CESPU (Cooperativa de Ensino Superior Politécnico e Universitário), Portugal
- Klaipėda State University of Applied Sciences (Klaipėdos valstybinė kolegija), Lithuania
- Unidade Local de Saúde de Almada-Seixal, EPE (ULSAS), Portugal
- Egas Moniz School of Health and Science, Portugal
- Universitat Internacional de Catalunya, Spain
- Bio GHP Global Health Platform S.A., Portugal
- FH Salzburg, Austria
- “Grigore T. Popa” University of Medicine and Pharmacy Iași, Romania
Jan Evangelista Purkyně University in Ústí nad Labem takes part as an associate partner.
Targets by the end of the project
- 6 test platforms (IoT-based testbeds and living labs for community healthcare)
- 1,050 participants in training and mentoring programmes
- 16 start-ups supported through prototyping, testing and business acceleration
- 8 partnerships with healthcare providers, companies and research organisations
What the project has delivered so far
- DigiCare Incubator Program 2025, launched by UMF Iași in November 2025: a one-month sprint for early-stage HealthTech startups from across Europe, with expert mentoring, access to university testbeds and a final Demo Day. The two top-performing startups move on to the DigiCare Accelerator. Incubator 2025
- CalmXR, presented by UIC Barcelona in December 2025: a virtual reality space with psychology-backed tools such as meditation, mindfulness, active breaks and green spaces, for stress management in university and workplace settings. Read the news
- DigiCare Mentoring Program, December 2025 to June 2026: six months of mentoring for Bachelor’s, Master’s and PhD students, early-career researchers and professionals, with personal matching to mentors from academia, industry and healthcare. Mentoring Program
- Free online courses, self-paced and open to learners worldwide: the Digital Health and Entrepreneurship Course for students (8 modules, 2 ECTS awarded by EIT Health), and the Digital Health Course (4 modules) and the Entrepreneurship Course (3 modules) for academics and professionals. Each course leads to a free certificate of participation. Courses
- DigiCare Innovation Accelerator: a nine-month hybrid programme for healthtech and digital-health startups at pre-seed or seed stage, at Technology Readiness Level 4 or above. Participation is free for selected startups; the accelerator does not provide direct funding. It runs in three phases (Validate, Grow & Pitch, Fund & Scale) in Portugal, Spain, Germany and Romania, and gives access to three testbeds: CalmXR in Barcelona (UIC Barcelona, digital mental health), the LivingLab in Iași (UMF Iași with the Regional Institute of Oncology Iași and GreenSoft, digital oncology care) and KogniHome in Bielefeld (HSBI, a smart-home living lab). In September 2026 the first accelerator cohort met the partner nodes. Accelerator Program
- Digital Health Challenge Lab, 30 September to 9 December 2026, coordinated by CESPU: interdisciplinary teams turn a real health need into a validated, responsible digital-health solution, in online sessions every two weeks. Challenge areas are community oncology, mental health and chronic diseases. Mentors from academia, healthcare and industry are invited to take part.
THRIVE: Transforming healthcare research into validated solutions through Alliance-KIC Cooperation
THRIVE is funded under the EIT Higher Education Initiative (Call 2025, Topic 2: EIT-HEI-2025-BUILDING-SYNERGIES). UIC Barcelona is the lead partner. Phase 1 runs from September 2026 to August 2028.
The project supports the EduCare 5.0 alliance in turning healthcare research into validated, market-ready solutions. It develops a simulation-based validation pipeline with five connected validation structures: clinical feasibility, multi-country health economics, medical device and AI regulatory intelligence, implementation readiness, and gender-equity venture support.
THRIVE also builds healthcare entrepreneurship capacity across the alliance through a three-level training model with micro-credentials, bootcamps, fellowships and certified trainers. Supported ventures follow a four-stage pathway from scouting and incubation to validation and referral to the EIT Knowledge and Innovation Communities. The project works with EIT Health and 28DIGITAL.
Full partners
- Universitat Internacional de Catalunya (UIC Barcelona), Spain (lead partner)
- Hochschule Bielefeld University of Applied Sciences and Arts, Germany
- CESPU, Portugal
- Consorci Sanitari de Terrassa, Spain
- Diaconia University of Applied Sciences, Finland
- Egas Moniz, Portugal
- Equip d’Atenció Primària Barcelona-Sardenya, S.L.P., Spain
- Evidify SL, Spain
- “Grigore T. Popa” University of Medicine and Pharmacy Iași, Romania
- IOMED Medical Solutions SL, Spain
- Jan Evangelista Purkyně University in Ústí nad Labem, Czechia
- Klaipėda State University of Applied Sciences (KVK), Lithuania
- Medical University of Łódź, Poland
- Salzburg University of Applied Sciences, Austria
Associated partners
- DEX Innovation Centre, Czechia
- Health Cluster Portugal (Associação do Pólo de Competitividade da Saúde), Portugal
Blended Intensive Programmes and staff training
Erasmus+ Blended Intensive Programmes (BIPs) are part of the alliance’s capacity-building plan to 2028. After an information session for partners on 12 February 2026, the alliance delivered the following programmes:
- Co-INSIGHT, 6–10 July 2026.
- Dual-Use in Medicine, 6–10 July 2026: 23 participants from five institutions, including UMF Iași.
- Research Management, a staff BIP at the HSBI Research Academy, September 2026: 28 participants from ten partner institutions in nine countries.
On 25 June 2026 the alliance’s Innovation and Research Academy also held the webinar “Navigating the HR Excellence in Research Award Journey”, on the HR Excellence in Research Award (HRS4R), in which the Medical University of Łódź shared its experience.
