This paper elaborates on the formats of situational and project-oriented education which, being embedded into university programs, enable senior technology and engineering students to develop design, project and entrepreneurial skills while working on real-life innovation challenges formulated by an industry partner. A non-exhaustive list of the mentioned formats is set out in the form of a conceptual model that describes an enterprise innovation process extended by the inclusion of academic thought-leadership and techsavvy students' insights into new products, services and business models development. Having completed a series of industry-supported hackathons and design-thinking workshops, the authors provide an explicit description of use-case scenarios, key success factors, and implications for applying the proposed model. The paper conclusion offers a list of benefits for using the model and further insights into setting up and running academia-business collaborations aimed at innovation design and applied research rather than skills development.

Information systems discipline is a quickly developing field of knowledge and to

12 MSc and 6 PhD engineering students from six different universities were engaged in design thinking session and were offered to tackle a challenge of creating a communication channel effectively bridging international IT company, its industry partners and customers, and academia in the new paradigm of Digital Business Framework.Key ideas generated by the participants of the Jam referred to creating a web-portal and mobile app that will support social-media type of communication between Industry and Academia. Suggested platform will allow businesses to deploy information about ongoing research projects, calls for participation for academia and in its turn could identify opportunities to join industry projects, position its areas of expertise and get better involved in understanding trends for educating future of workforce.The framework describes herebelow the main steps towards stable, successful, long-term academia-industry cooperation. The framework is industry-oriented, meaning that the process is initiated by the enterprise partner.

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