Budapest Business University

BBS's diverse research and scientific activities are characterised by a focus on corporate practice, research topics that are relevant and topical for economic actors, and also have practical significance. Our research teams work on R&D projects with key players in the Hungarian economy. There are currently more than 60 research groups at BBS and the Research Fund grant scheme funded 7 research projects at the University in 2019. Reflecting on the strategic areas of BBS, we have established four Centres of Excellence at the University focusing on the four main areas of our applied research activities. The Centres of Excellence are key players in their respective fields of activity in Hungary, play an important role in the relationship between higher education and businesses and carry out high quality applied scientific research relevant to practice, involving business partners and students.

Goal:

Budapest LAB helps to spread entrepreneurial culture and the success of Hungarian SMEs by sharing knowledge, conducting its own and partnered research, training, and inspiration. Supporting the BBS in partnership with entrepreneurs’ strategic pillar, the workshop aims to become one of the most respected research, development, training, and knowledge service providers in Central Europe.

Focus Areas:

• Research – In addition to the scientific results, Budapest LAB also pays special attention to the applicability of its research. The Family Business Research Programme is linked to the LAB, which is the first in Hungary to examine the specifics of that group of entrepreneurs. In addition to family businesses, research topics also focus on start-ups, freelancers, and business mentoring.
• Education – Budapest LAB assists the development of entrepreneurial skills and the spread of entrepreneurial culture, both within and outside the walls of BBS, with innovative and effective methods and programmes. It conducts educational activities, from lectures and events to self-developed intensive courses, on various platforms and often in collaboration with others.
• Inspiration – In an interesting and understandable way, both online and offline, as the key objective is to provide young people with inspiration and useful knowledge about entrepreneurship. Through its online magazine and its series of events, Budapest LAB shares the accumulated knowledge related to entrepreneurship in an interesting and consumable way.

Goal:

FHERC explores the challenges and opportunities for the future of higher education through a wide range of participatory, national, and international research collaborations and innovative methodologies. It is committed to serving as a high-level research and knowledge-sharing workshop to help understand the challenges and opportunities for the future of higher education for the academic community, the business and corporate sector, higher education stakeholders, future students, and society as a whole.

Focus Areas:

• Research – As a high-level research and knowledge-sharing workshop, FHERC helps to identify challenges and opportunities for the future of higher education, especially in the field of business higher education. Their results, scientific research and publications are useful to the academic community, the economic and corporate sectors, higher education actors, future students, and society as a whole.
• Dissemination – In addition to research, the FHERC team is active in domestic and international competitions, regularly organises conferences and professional workshops, and participates in prestigious scientific events with speakers. FHERC also performs editorial, guest editorial and expert tasks, including participation in the Global Essay Mills Survey (GEMS) project and editing a special issue of Futures and providing expert background material for the European Union Joint Research Centre (JRC), ‘The future of higher education - with the concept of an entrepreneurial university in focus’.

Goal

The Centre of Excellence for Sustainability Impacts in Business and Society (CESIBUS), in line with the mission of the BBS, works to create and transfer knowledge on sustainability and responsibility, in the following fields:

·      Conducting research in Hungary and internationally;

·      Produce educational materials and implement educational activities;

·      Collaborating with academic and corporate partners;

·      Create, develop, and implement educational and training activities with partners in the field of research and education;

·      Ensure visibility of the topic and the possibility of cooperation and joint work between researchers in the field at university level.

Focus areas

• Research - The Centre of Excellence works on a broad range of sustainability issues in two main research streams:
• Sustainability Impacts in Business - Sustainability in Organisations and the Value Chain: this stream researches the corporate and societal impact of sustainability and its measurability, with a particular focus on value chain integration.
• Sustainability Impacts in Society - sustainability beyond business: diversity and equal opportunities. In this stream, we focus on the social dimension of sustainability, including diversity and equal opportunities in business and society.
• Education - The Centre of Excellence's main task is to provide up-to-date information from this particular field to the BBS’s citizens, its partners, and external stakeholders as well. We provide new knowledge and research results for the BA course Responsible and Sustainable Company, which is compulsory at all three faculties of our University. In addition, we produce case study-based learning materials to ensure the horizontal dissemination of the topic, with the possibility of integration into other subjects. We also participate in national and international conferences and projects in order to create and use knowledge on sustainability as widely as possible.

Goal

Global value chains and supply chains are an integral part of our current economy. Their investigation reveal the global-scale division of work involving a lot of firms, carriers and other stakeholders. In this system, Hungary and Hungarian companies are also deeply embedded. In the past couple of years, it became evident that these global networks are under transformation because of technological developments and other megatrends. In order to ensure that we are up-to-date with the ongoing transformation of global value chains, and to help Hungarian companies benefit from these changes, it is essential to investigate the operation and structure of these networks, the supply chains, the governance practices and innovation processes together with their impact on the local economy and potential tasks for policy-making.

The Centre of Excellence for Future Value Chains (FVC) have been established to do research on global value chains and supply chains and on their future for the benefit of the Hungarian economy. The Centre involves researchers from all three faculties of BBS.

Focus area:

• Research - The research activities of FVC are focusing on two, interrelated and complementary aspects, which designate the two research streams of the Centre:
• Analysing the structural changes of global value chains (macro approach)
• Exploring the changes in business management, highlighting the impact of digital technologies on productivity and efficiency (micro approach)

The combination of the macro- and micro aspects in the research approach will lead to a more complex understanding of these structures, because the international flow of products and services is the sum of the values added and the economic results in the various layers of global value chains.

Goal

Traveling, visiting, or tourism in the traditional sense is an increasingly integral part of our lives, and interactions with non-locals are becoming more and more important for a socio-economic community. The aim of CEVE is to examine the current state, connections, and future possibilities of the visitor economy, relying on the knowledge and network capital of BBS-FCHT. CEVE aims to serve tourism higher education as a knowledge-creating and knowledge-sharing community, strengthening its corporate and social relations.

Focus areas

·        Research – CEVE undertakes to carry out research that, in addition to the publication of scientific publications, can help the work of the businesses and social actors involved, deepen the knowledge and broaden the horizons of tourism students in higher education. The focus of the research is always the visitor experience, the quality of the time spent visiting, the contribution of the visit to the quality of life, and the interactions that take place at the site of the visit, which often cannot be monetized or objectified.

·        Dissemination – Through its scientific publications, CEVE wants to increase its scientific reputation and international recognition of BBS-FCHT. However, in comparison with other disciplines, the practical applicability and comprehensibility of research results are crucially important in the field of tourism. Therefore, CEVE specifically strives to activate social relations and to practice and develop science communication that is understandable to the general public.