"Empowering talents, inspiring leaders" – this is the guiding mission of the University of St.Gallen (HSG). We enable our students to become responsible, entrepreneurial leaders. During the 2025 reporting period, we made progress in further embedding sustainability across our institution. In doing so, we follow our vision and are committed to a broad understanding of sustainability, which includes responsibility for the environment, society and the economy.
As one of Europe’s leading business universities, HSG is proud of its faculty whose research addresses pressing grand challenges of our time. The HSG Impact Awards have once again recognized projects with tangible societal relevance, ranging from circular economy and smart criminal justice to responsibility in supply chains. These contributions exemplify our strategic focus on knowledge that matters – for business and society alike.
As part of our holistic approach to education, a new joint Master’s Certificate in Global Sustainability Management (GSM) has been launched. A programme like no other in Europe, GSM is co-developed and co-taught by experts from leading European institutions in Business, Economics, and Social Sciences as part of the Engage.EU alliance. This new certificate complements existing offers and contributes to our goal of empowering dedicated talents to think and act entrepreneurially and to assume responsibility.
Our engaged students are deeply committed to turning innovative ideas into impactful solutions. A standout example is one of the compulsory courses in the Master’s Certificate in Managing Climate Solutions (MaCS-HSG), where students translate theory into climate action. Their collaboration in planning and implementing new solar energy installations on several HSG buildings exemplifies how academic learning and sustainability transformation on campus go hand in hand.
Many entrepreneurial solutions to the grand challenges of our time emerge from the HSG ecosystem through startups developed and led by our students. Two examples are the current Champions of HSG’s Best Founders Programme, fortyfour and ZoneIn, which are creating societal value through their innovative work on carbon capture and mental health, respectively. In addition, 56% of the businesses awarded the HSG Startup or Spin-off label in 2025 directly focus on solutions to sustainability challenges.
At the institutional level, the St.Gallen Transformation Lab further strengthened our regional ties by rolling out its activities to co-develop innovative and sustainable solutions for the St.Gallen region and beyond.
None of this progress would have been possible without the dedication of our university community. I am deeply grateful to our students, faculty, staff, and partners for their engagement. Based on this strong foundation, we are excited to continue our sustainability journey.
Professor Manuel Ammann
President, University of St.Gallen (HSG)