The HEINZ Group has been a partner of UnternehmerTUM since 2023. Run by the third and fourth generations, the family business from Moosburg an der Isar brings more than 90 years of experience in waste management, the circular economy, and transport and logistics. The HEINZ Group combines tradition and innovation with the ambition to help shape its industry of tomorrow, and deliberately opens up to new partnerships and external innovation.
Josef Heinz, Managing Director of the HEINZ Group, sums up the goal:
Working with UnternehmerTUM is above all about looking beyond the boundaries of our relevant industries and getting an impression, at management level, of which developments might shape the economy over the next three to four years. We want to further develop this exchange with science and universities in the coming years.
Josef Heinz,
Geschäftsführer der HEINZ Gruppe
This is not about short-term impulses but about structural knowledge transfer: What is driving other industries? Which technologies will be relevant in three to four years? What mindsets does it take to keep a company with a long tradition future-proof?
Through its FamilienUnternehmerTUM partnership, the HEINZ Group taps into the innovation ecosystem in a targeted way: support for its AI transformation through the AI Mittelstand Accelerator together with appliedAI, with a first jointly implemented use case; access to relevant startups and experts in the circular economy; and cross-industry exchange with other family businesses on topics such as startup collaboration and investment.
Josef Heinz is a mentor at the high-tech accelerator XPRENEURS. There he met Twogee, an XPRENEURS alumnus offering tailored enzyme solutions for the industrial use of biomass. Heinz Ventures GmbH invested in the seed round, an investment that grew directly out of the ecosystem. With Heinz Ventures GmbH, the HEINZ Group has built a corporate venture arm that invests in strategically relevant startups in biotech, recycling, and the circular economy: as a trend radar and a basis for new strategic partnerships.
The next generation is getting involved: Otto Georg Heinz, responsible for sales and organizational development, is driving the AI and digital transformation and is taking part in the current cohort of NextGen4Bavaria, the program of the Bavarian State Ministry for Digital Affairs that prepares successors for their future role and supports them in the strategic development of their companies. Gloria Heinz, responsible for marketing and communications, is strengthening the HEINZ Group’s visibility among tomorrow’s talent, for example by hosting the Family Business Club @TUM in Moosburg in 2025, which brings together NextGens and students interested in family businesses.
The HEINZ Group shows the value both sides can gain when family businesses think strategically about innovation ecosystems and get involved: from strategic knowledge transfer and investment to developing the next generation.
Do you want to make targeted use of the UnternehmerTUM innovation ecosystem as a family business?
Get in touch with the FamilienUnternehmerTUM team directly: familien@unternehmertum.de
