With the opening of the “Fusion Campus” in Düsseldorf, NRW is strengthening its position as a leading games location. Managing Director Stefanie Waschk explains to VIVID why the gaming industry is much better than its reputation and how it can drive innovation in all sectors of the economy.

The gaming industry is the subject of controversy: While critics voice concerns about the level of violence in some games and the risk of addiction for children and young people, more and more users are discovering the positive effects of educational or entertainment games. In any case, the industry is booming. In 2020, the year of the coronavirus pandemic, sales in Germany alone rose to a total of 8.5 billion euros. Compared to the previous year, this was a 32 percent increase.The state government has also been focusing on the games development industry for many years and is now supporting the establishment of a new centre of excellence, the “Fusion Campus”. This may seem a little unusual at first glance, but on closer inspection it quickly becomes clear that the industry has much more to offer than the general public might imagine.

The “Fusion Campus”, which opened in July and which, in addition to the state of North Rhine-Westphalia as a sponsor, has also brought Gladstone Capital and Ubisoft Blue Byte on board as shareholders, sees itself as a kind of advisory centre that wants to network the gaming and entertainment industry with other sectors of the economy nationwide.

NRW Minister President Armin Laschet was also present at the opening of the Fusion Campus in July. The state government has been focusing on the games development sector since 2017 and is now supporting the establishment of the new centre for three years with funding of 750,000 euros.

Stefanie Waschk, managing director and main shareholder of the “Fusion Campus”, who can look back on more than 20 years of experience in the gaming industry, is responsible for coordinating the whole enterprise. “Yet I'm not actually a digital native. I studied mathematics with a focus on economics, so I don't come from the IT sector. Originally, I wanted to work in a bank,” she laughs. Accordingly, her first job as a project manager in the games industry was only supposed to be a short detour. “But I was immediately in love with the industry, with its different people and mindsets. You could constantly learn new things - from technologies to business models. That fascinated me. I then learned programming myself and worked for many years as a site and project manager: for the development of projects of different platforms and the international market.”

“We hope to recruit and support many German, but also international young teams.”

After eleven years, she changed sides and managed several state projects, including Engage.NRW, which saw itself as an interface between software developers and companies. “Back then I was still something of a maverick, but now many large companies are doing gamification,” Stefanie Waschk explains.

Gamification - what does that mean anyway? “Gamification is what companies in a wide variety of business sectors can learn from the gaming industry by using game design elements or motivational design etc. in a non-gaming context,” Stefanie Waschk explains. Skilled workers, for example, use virtual reality, or VR for short, to learn how to operate a machine. Or it illustrates complex surgical procedures to assistant doctors and students. “Behind this are scientific findings from brain research, psychology or cognitive sciences,” says Stefanie Waschk. But there are even more areas of application for gaming know-how in companies:

Training for employees, such as “Firefighter VR”,
a training programme for firefighters in which they can learn dangerous situations or resuscitations in a safe space.
In order to familiarise their employees with IT security guidelines, many companies have developed applications in which people can understand and learn to implement the often very complicated
rules in a playful way.
In the area of health, gamification is being used more and more. For patients in rehabilitation, for example, there are playful solutions that motivate them to carry out the exercises necessary for rehabilitation over a longer period of time.

Stefanie Waschk is the managing director and main shareholder of the ”Fusion Campus”. She can look back on over 20 years of experience in the gaming industry.

Gamification has also become an important factor in research or education - VR makes even the driest topics exciting. And urban planning and architecture use the know-how of the gaming industry to recreate future projects in 3D and make them tangible. Stefanie Waschk is certain that gamification will soon be an integral part of our everyday lives. That's why the “Fusion Campus” wants to do networking work to create synergies between the gaming industry, young and old-established companies and science. In addition, there is strategic project consulting, potential analyses that highlight opportunities and risks. “We offer a tool that can contribute a lot when used correctly. We develop business cases and define success factors. We know the industry and know where to find suitable experts, support with tenders or pitches or act as interpreters and facilitators between the creative and very tech-savvy service providers and the companies. Ultimately, we want above all to see and convey each other's needs and requirements so that everything from strategy and idea to implementation goes well.” In order to be able to guarantee all this, the “Fusion Campus” has rented the premises of co-partner Ubisoft Blue Byte, where the infrastructure of the computer game developer can be shared.

In addition to advising medium-sized companies and corporations, another focus of the “Fusion Campus” is on start-ups. To this end, a programme has been developed that promotes not only gaming teams, but also young companies with innovative project ideas at the interface to other economic sectors. “We hope to recruit and support many German, but also international young teams,” says Stefanie Waschk.

The “Fusion Campus” is a flagship project that institutionalised the transfer of innovation between different industries for the first time. “In NRW we have the advantage that there is a huge amount of industry here. In addition, there are numerous universities where you can study specialised know-how for gaming: These are location factors that are not so easy to reproduce in other places! Regardless of the headquarters in Düsseldorf, however, we will be active nationwide!” •

Words Katja Vaders
Pictures iStock, Fusion Campus, Silvia Reimann

Game on!

With the opening of the “Fusion Campus” in Düsseldorf, NRW is strengthening its position as a leading games location. Managing Director Stefanie Waschk explains to VIVID why the gaming industry is much better than its reputation and how it can drive innovation in all sectors of the economy.

“We hope to recruit and support many German, but also international young teams.”