Promoting Research and Teaching

WU’s Board of Trustees was established 120 years ago. Since then, the Board of Trustees has been loyal to our university. It has supported us in projects for WU’s further development, in various research and teaching projects, as well as in the acquisition of new buildings, such as the Althanstraße university center and the D5 building on Campus WU.

We have now created a new, more modern infrastructure for the promotion of research and teaching. The Board of Trustees has been disbanded and its assets transferred to the new WU (Vienna University of Economics and Business) Foundation established in 2020. This new nonprofit foundation is the cornerstone for the efficient and effective support of our university’s projects.

Successful Partnerships

WU maintains long-standing partnerships with many reputable companies. Despite the difficult economic situation in the pandemic year, we were able to maintain and in some cases extend these cooperations. We have also already succeeded in setting up projects for the coming years.

In spring, we launched the WU Alumni Marketplace, a platform where companies can reach out to the alumni community with special offers. To provide additional support to our alumni during the COVID-19 crisis, we offered individual entrepreneurs and one-person companies owned by WU alumni free advertising.

How Alumni Support WU

In late 2019, we developed a program to give our dedicated alumni the opportunity to provide financial support to WU. The program was launched in 2020. It has been well received by our alumni, many of whom now support WU with regular donations. In addition, many alumni choose to sponsor special projects in teaching and research with a one-time contribution.

Our Alumni Community

It’s important to us to keep in touch with our graduates and offer them a platform for networking and continuing education. This is why we establish and support WU Alumni Hubs and events and have created the new alumni magazine “forward.”

WU Alumni Hubs

The over 60 WU Alumni Hubs around the world make a valuable contribution to building our international community. They serve as communication hubs and also organize a number of events with the support of the Corporate Relations & Alumni Services office. Event topics are selected based on the local situation and the needs of alumni in the respective country. In December 2020, a new hub was established in the innovative environment of the San Francisco Bay Area. In five existing hubs, new hub managers took over this important voluntary function.

Fascinating events

Our events are popular meeting places for WU alumni. In 2020, we launched two new event series: the WU Alumni Future Talks and the WU Alumni Keynotes. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, we had to switch our events to online formats. The virtual events were very well received by the alumni community. One positive effect was that holding the events online gave WU alumni from other countries and time zones the opportunity to attend the talks and network with each other.

A high-quality magazine

Our alumni want to stay up to date on what’s going on at WU. We created our new glossy magazine “forward” to inform and inspire our alumni community. It is published twice a year and features the latest news about WU, current research, interviews with faculty members, portraits of WU alumni, and much more.

The first issue of the magazine, on “The Future of Education,”  focused particularly on digitalization, which is a strategically important issue for WU. The second issue addressed the coronavirus pandemic: The magazine explored the EU’s role in dealing with the pandemic, the interaction between crises and increased innovation in companies, and aspects of prosocial behavior in times of crisis.

Developing new ideas

In 2020, we finalized a concept for the formation of a WU Alumni Advisory Board. Starting in 2021, this board will support the Corporate Relations & Alumni Services office with new fundraising projects and consult with them on relationship management with WU alumni. The board is international and diverse. It will meet twice a year, and its members work on a voluntary basis.