Practical experience
Landing a job takes more than talent, it takes action. Demola gives you the chance to tackle real challenges, collaborate with others, and build proof of what you can do even when things are uncertain. By actively participating in a Demola project, you can turn your skills into competencies and concrete experience.
Partnered with Innovative Companies
Our platform, created together with leading companies and professors, connects you to real-world innovation projects. You’ll work as part of a team on an innovation and development project, guided by Demola’s expert facilitators. Participating in a project will give you practical experience and the confidence to deal with complexity in any job.
At Demola, innovation projects are built around real-world project topics co-designed with companies and public-sector organisations. If selected, you'll join an innovation team working to develop meaningful solutions that respond to validated needs.
Our projects tackle complex, relevant problems grounded in industry and societal needs. You'll work in a team to design and demo solutions, benefiting from the insights and findings of previous Demola projects. Most Demola projects last around two months, but the exact duration depends on the programme they are part of.
Each team benefits from expert guidance through coaching sessions and facilitated community events. Demola's facilitators bring years of experience in innovation and adapt their support to match your ambition and commitment. You are expected to take an active role, both individually and as a team.
You'll co-create with other teams and Demola's experts, and validate and test your solutions with real stakeholders to continuously refine your approach. High-performing teams gain access to a network of professionals from Demola's industry partners for further input and exposure.
You'll build in-demand, career-ready skills in creative problem-solving, AI-assisted innovation, project management, international collaboration, and resilience - all while working in an environment that mirrors real innovation practices.
Your team owns the outcomes created during the project. Use them in job interviews, your portfolio, a Master's thesis, or even as the foundation of a startup. In some cases, your work may also earn you academic credit (ECTS) if you are a student.
The impact
Ready to turn your skills into competence? Our claims are backed by feedback from our community of participants and alumni.
Strongly agree (49.3%)
Agree (43.6%)
Neither agree or disagree (5.3%)
Disagree (1.3%)
Strongly disagree (0.5%)
2 272 people took part in the survey.
New skills
65.6%
Valuable work experience
63.9%
New friends
51.5%
Startup ideas
34.4%
International teamwork experience
30.5%
Industry contacts
23.9%
Self-esteem
23.9%
New motivation to study
22.8%
Confidence in career choices
20.3%
Researcher contacts
17.6%
Better position in the labor market
13.5%
Other
1.5%
Based on Q4/2022 survey
If you’re currently studying at or near one of our Demola locations or partner universities, you’re welcome to join a Demola project.
Finland:Tampere, Oulu, Vaasa, Turku, Jyväskylä
Japan:Tokyo, Sapporo
Czechia:Prague, Ostrava
Hungary:Budapest
United Kingdom:Glasgow
India:DelhiIn our partner cities, the projects are also open to graduates and professionals who are exploring new career paths or interested in co-creating and launching startups in the future.
Finland:Tampere, Oulu, Riihimäki
Many alumni have participated in more than one Demola project – the current record is seven. For active alumni, we facilitate further development in their academic studies or future careers:
Explore or fine-tune your Master’s thesis topic through a Demola project and find a potential industry collaborator for your Master’s thesis after the project.
Develop an expert profile that highlights your project contributions, as well as innovation and interpersonal skills. Top-performing participants will have their expert profiles shared and recommended within Demola’s partner network, verifying their skills and proactive mindset.
Build on your project results, connect with like-minded teammates, and use your entrepreneurial mindset to lay the groundwork for a startup.
Get onboarded with Demola
Create a Demola profile.
Browse project in your location and apply to those that interest you.
If you get selected, confirm your seat and start the teamwork.
Apply to one or more projects today!
Future Expert Program - Vantaa, Prague, Tampere, Vaasa
Value Creators of Tomorrow
An enormous amount of valuable information is created within social innovation ecosystems. However, this knowledge is frequently fragmented across various documents, databases, and individual accounts, making it difficult to find, understand, and apply. This lack of a centralized, user-friendly hub prevents a shared understanding and hinders the development of new ideas based on what the community already knows. A solution is needed that can organize this information and transform it into a dynamic, collective resource. Different ecosystems, projects, and communities generate a wealth of valuable knowledge—from data and reports to best practices—but this information often remains scattered and underutilized. To unlock the full potential of collective intelligence, we need a solution that not only makes this knowledge visible and accessible but also provides an interactive, AI-assisted interface for discovery and insight generation. In this project we aim at designing a user interface that provides a clear, high-level overview of the knowledge base's content and structure. This interface should be intuitive for both experts and newcomers, allowing them to quickly discover relationships between different data points (e.g., projects, people, reports, and concepts). How might we create simple and easy AI tools to assist the users to find the meaningful information and understand the relations of the findings and results?
Apply by 26 Oct
Delhi, Future Expert Program - Vantaa, Vaasa
Healing the Planet
Today’s online shopping ecosystem is dominated by speed. Express air cargo is often promoted as the “premium” option for consumers who want their goods as fast as possible. However, air cargo is highly unsustainable, with a large carbon footprint. Meanwhile, consumer behaviors are shifting: people are buying more and more online — whether out of need, desire, or impulse. Yet almost all logistics services are geared towards speed, not sustainability, leaving a gap in the market for consumers who would value transparency, sustainability, and quality over speed. How might we create a premium, slow, and sustainable logistics service for consumers? If “fast” is no longer the definition of premium, what would make “slow” feel desirable? How can sustainability, traceability, and transparency become the selling points of a logistics service? How might consumers be engaged and informed about their package’s journey to create trust and pride in their choices? How can we leverage data and technology to make this service radically transparent? This project invites you to rethink logistics through servitization: how to make the experience as easy, trustworthy, and attractive as possible for consumers — while keeping sustainability at its core.
Apply by 26 Oct
Future Expert Program - Vantaa, Vaasa
Healing the Planet
In this project we want to focus on sustainable consumer decision-making. As a context we are interested in aviation industry. In aviation, by far most of the sustainability burden comes from the fuel used by the airplane. There are many options nowadays for different bio-based fuels and even electric aviation is being developed rapidly. Yet the change will take time and the main concern is that consumers are not willing to pay extra for the sustainable options. At the same time the airlines are doing very little to offer real, valuable options for customers when buying airline tickets. Most of the initiatives are based on carbon compensation or small details in the in-flight service. In this project we want to focus on designing new types of offerings for the sustainably-minded younger generations who want or need to fly for their work or vacation. What would be the sustainable airline ticket type for younger generation customers in the future? How should we visualize the sustainability information for the customer when they are buying the tickets? What kind of promises we should make and what kind of data could be useful for the customer? How might we verify the claims and build transparency for the customers? This project is for you, if you are interested in business models, sustainability, consumer behaviour, new technologies or aviation industry!
Apply by 26 Oct
Future Expert Program - Riihimaki, Future Expert Program - Vantaa, Oulu, Vaasa
Human Beings in the Modern World
Healthcare regions in Finland utilise a Home Hospital service (Kotisairaala) to provide hospital-level care directly in patients' homes. It's designed for individuals who require acute, subacute, or palliative care but can be treated outside a traditional hospital. The Home Hospital team, typically comprising doctors, nurses, and other healthcare professionals, offers services such as intravenous therapies, wound care, medication management, monitoring of vital signs, and symptom control. The aim is to promote recovery in a familiar environment, reduce hospital stays, and enhance quality of life, often allowing patients to remain close to their families. In this service, involving patients and their close ones is essential, as patients live at home and are monitored around the clock. A new resource planning system is being developed for Home Hospital professionals to optimise care and improve patient experience. This system tracks equipment and personnel and supports planning the best possible care. We want to explore what kind of value adding data points could be shared with the patients and/or their families to increase transparency and perceived service quality. What kind of (real-time or static) information would be most valuable for patients? How can we create new forms of value by increasing transparency? This project aims to design a user experience that allows patients and their families to request, update, and track Home Hospital services in the future.
Apply by 26 Oct
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Future Expert Program - Riihimaki, Future Expert Program - Vantaa
Byte-powered Future
Finland has 108 cities and 200 municipalities, each with its own decision-making bodies led by politicians and/or municipal officials. This generates thousands of public records every month from municipal council, board, and local government meetings, creating an enormous database of decision-making documents that is impossible for anyone to follow in detail. Journalists are working hard to keep up with this information, but the sheer volume makes it an overwhelming task. How could we create a tool to help journalists identify the most important municipal decisions and plans, enabling them to produce insightful stories and hold decision-makers accountable? How might AI be used to scan these vast collections of documents for the most influential decisions, illegal procedures, odd budgeting practices, or other anomalies? How should the tool visualise this information and highlight potentially interesting topics for journalists? The goal is not for AI to write stories – that remains the journalist’s role – but to increase transparency and guide journalists toward the hidden stories unfolding every week across Finland.
Apply by 26 Oct
Budapest, Future Expert Program - Vantaa, Glasgow, Tampere
Healing the Planet
Local sustainability initiatives are a powerful force for change, with communities launching projects ranging from neighbourhood composting hubs to energy co-operatives. However, these vital efforts often hit the wall due to persistent challenges. Funding is frequently short-term or grant-based, resulting in an uncertain future. Ownership and accountability are often unclear, and decision-making can be informal or centralised, disengaging the very people the projects are intended to serve. This structural fragility prevents small, impactful projects from scaling or enduring over time. We need a new approach to enable communities to collectively fund, manage, and sustain these initiatives for the long term. How can we design a new framework for funding and managing local sustainability initiatives that is transparent, inclusive, and genuinely owned by the community? The goal is to create a product, business model, or governance mechanism that allows diverse stakeholders to co-own and co-finance grassroots projects – moving beyond short-term grants and top-down decision-making to build resilient, community-led solutions. How might people collectively fund a project while maintaining a transparent record of contributions? How can voting on proposals or shared rules be made fair and engaging for all participants? What is a simple and effective way to manage shared assets and resources within a trust-based system?
Apply by 26 Oct
See how Demola has helped students around the world succeed in their careers and personal lives.
Master’s Degree student in Research and Innovation in Higher Education
Excellent
20/04/2023
“I enjoy connecting with other people who are not from the same area and field, and creating new things. I think Demola is a very great platform and, since I’m interested in education, I think this is a great idea to help students and other people to learn in a different way and to be closer to the work life.”
Master’s Student in Public and Global Health
Excellent
20/04/2023
“I joined Demola for the third time already, since I enjoy how my personal skills are developing here and I love the feeling of freedom of thoughts, to be able to think, feel and express anything.”
Master’s Student in Sustainable Digitalisation
Excellent
20/04/2023
“I wanted more experience in interdisciplinary project work and real-life, tangible development of solutions with external stakeholders. I also wanted to practice what the design process is like in the real world and how to present novel ideas in an attractive, business- oriented way. And Demola delivered!”
Master’s Degree Student in Engineering and Technology
Excellent
10/06/2022
“In Demola we focused on creating solutions that can and should be applicable and should happen in real life, concrete and implementable solutions that can have an impact. Those type of solutions that go way beyond than just making a new website or a nice social media page.”
Master of Business
Excellent
17/04/2023
“If you have successfully completed the Demola project, it is proof of your passion and that your mindset is inevitably customer-oriented. Demola is definitely an experience I can recommend to all students.”
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