Trend Seminar
7 weeks. One strategic question. Your first CDTM course.
In Trend Seminar you learn how to get into a sector or market, think about its future trajectory and build hypotheses quickly. You pick up research, presentation, debating and pitching skills, meet experts, founders and VCs, and are onboarded into the CDTM community.
In the Trend Seminar you learn how to get into a sector or market, think about its future trajectory and build hypotheses quickly. You pick up research, presentation, debating and pitching skills, meet experts, founders and VCs, and are onboarded into the CDTM community: it is the first course every new class goes through together.
What the Trend Seminar is.
- Trend research meets innovation thinking
You identify the trends and drivers that will shape a topic, build possible future scenarios and signposts, and ideate business ideas that fit those futures.
- One partner, one question
One corporate or public partner per edition brings a strategic “Future of …” question. Topic and scope are set by the partner; you choose your trend category, your scenario and your business idea.
- Experts, coaches and VCs
Expert lectures, coaching by the supervising PhD candidates and VC sessions get you into the topic fast.
- A public finale and a printed report
Everything ends in a public final presentation and the CDTM Trend Report, which joins a 20-year archive.
The course in numbers
- 26
- Students per class
- 7 weeks
- Full-time, in the semester break
- 2
- Supervising PhD candidates
- 5-6
- Students per team, teams rotate per phase
- 25
- Trends in the report, five per category
- 5
- Opportunity spaces
- 5
- Business models
- 200+
- Ideas generated
- 120+
- Pages in the report, drawing on 500+ sources
- ~12
- Expert and research sessions, plus your own interviews
- 20 years
- How far the scenarios look ahead
- 45
- Trend reports since 2005
The Trend Seminar is worth 9 ECTS, about a quarter of the 38-ECTS Technology Management program. It can be accredited to your main degree; how many ECTS are recognised depends on your faculty.
Four things you leave with
- How to get into any sector fast
Map a field, find the drivers, build and defend hypotheses in days, not months.
- Futures thinking
Trends 5 to 15 years out, scenarios 20 years out, and business ideas tested against those futures.
- A real network from day one
Experts lecture and take your questions, VCs coach your ideas, and you leave with a list of expert interviews you organised yourself.
- Your class and the community
Seven weeks full-time with 26 people, team rooms at the center, weekly feedback, class reps, the party you organise: the Trend Seminar is where you become a Centerling.
It matters afterwards for research and problem solving, for founding and for strategy work. Siemens used the results of its seminar for R&D projects and hired students for internships and full-time roles.
One partner per edition
The most asked questions
- Do I have to take the Trend Seminar?
- Yes. It is the first of the three core courses, every admitted student is enrolled automatically and participation is mandatory. Passing it opens every other course at CDTM. Trend Seminar and MPD are taken at the beginning of your time at CDTM.
- Is it really full-time?
- Yes. Seven weeks, in person at the center in Munich, roughly 9 am to 6 pm with group work in the evenings as deadlines approach. Plan to have no thesis deadline, job or startup commitments in those weeks, and keep the weekend before communication week free.
- Can I do an internship at the same time?
- No. Attendance is checked and graded; students who tried had to take vacation for the overlap.
- What happens if I am sick or have an exam?
- Valid absences with proof are fine.
- Who sets the topic?
- One corporate or public partner per edition brings a “Future of …” question: recently Industrial AI with Siemens AI Lab (Spring ’26) and AI agents and robotics in energy and natural resources with SAP (Fall ’26).
- How are teams formed?
- Teams of five to six that rotate per phase: five category teams in the trends phase, new teams for exploration and ideation, and report teams (editing, layout, quality, sources, pictures, marketing) in communication week.
- Do I need a technical or business background?
- No. Classes are deliberately interdisciplinary: computer science, engineering, business, natural and life sciences, design. The seminar starts with a research bootcamp and method workshops.
- How many ECTS is it worth?
- 9 ECTS, about a quarter of the 38-ECTS Technology Management program. It can be accredited to your main degree; how many ECTS are recognised depends on your faculty. After the course you receive a confirmation of participation and an email from Program Management with the steps.