SMEs Get a Boost for International Business
The International Business students’ IB-HUB project offers internationalisation services for SMEs in Southwest Finland. In the project, students from Finland and abroad combine their extensive local knowledge of their respective home countries.
Text: Teijo Pöyhönen, communications trainee
“We offer companies a shared project model that is divided into short and agile phases, and keep closely in touch with the customer. The results that are pursued in steps are defined as concrete enough”, describes IB-HUB Project Manager Matti Kuikka.
Matti Kuikka has gained almost 20 years of international work experience in the telecommunications field, e.g. at Ericsson before coming to work at TUAS. The IB-HUB project also involves other members of TUAS’ staff from the international business unit at Lemminkäisenkatu.
“If the project start looks promising and after the beginning phase there is a consensus that it should be continued, a step-by-step continuation plan for the service is agreed with concrete milestones. At the same time, the project cost charged from the company is defined. It is based on the working hours used by the staff who guide the students and the needed equipment”, says Kuikka.
Seminars to Boost Cooperation
IB-HUB students organise two internationalisation seminars yearly. At the seminar, SMEs have an excellent opportunity to get to know the project services and network with the project cooperation partners, which include e.g. the Team Finland network. Matti Kuikka thinks that there still lie vast amounts of untapped possibilities in the cooperation between studies and working life.
Cooperation within TUAS speeds up students’ learning processes and the quick sharing of good practices. Similar procedures are implemented in game companies, where quick answers to which methods work and which should not be continued is always a source of joy.
This autumn, IB-HUB aims at intensifying the cooperation also with other TUAS projects.