Our history

Convinced that the quality of life at work and on our campuses is an essential condition for individual and collective fulfillment, we are committed to a strong and inclusive social approach aimed at students and staff alike. To this end, we have set up a number of initiatives to help everyone find their place: a solidarity fund, support for students with disabilities, internal training and awareness campaigns on gender equality and against all forms of discrimination, and a healthcare access network.

As early as 2012, the award of the Initiative of Excellence (IDEX) label enabled AMU to rank among the best universities in the world. In 2016, this dynamic of excellence was reinforced with the creation of the A*Midex foundation by AMU and our partners (CNRS, Inserm, CEA, IRD, ECM, IEP, AP-HM, IPC). A*Midex contributes to the deployment of innovative and experimental projects of international scope. With an annual budget of 26 million euros, A*Midex stimulates unprecedented and ambitious synergies in five areas: energy, the environment, health and life sciences, science and technology, and the humanities.

Innovation is at the heart of our identity and our project. AMU is equipped with modern tools and bodies that enhance the research carried out in our laboratories. In 2018, we contributed to the creation of the Cité de l'innovation et des Savoirs d'Aix-Marseille Université (CISAM), a unique place that brings together all those working on the dynamics of innovation, valorisation, transfer and business creation. Identified as one of the 25 places that are changing the face of innovation in France, CISAM has helped launch the CISAM+ project in 2021, which duplicates its model across 7 thematic antennas to amplify its action with academic, socio-economic and cultural authorities. We also support a number of student entrepreneurship initiatives, such as the Pôle Étudiant pour l'Innovation le Transfert et l'Entrepreneuriat (PÉPITE PROVENCE) created in 2014, and have a proactive policy of raising the profile of technological and scientific platforms, as well as the Pôle d'Innovation Territoriaux (PIT), which promote research.

Alongside innovation, we are committed to interdisciplinarity to meet the challenges of tomorrow. In 2020, we created 18 thematic institutes to bring disciplines into dialogue with each other, thereby generating new knowledge, nurturing talent but also attracting researchers from all over the world. Since 2018, the creation of the Groupements Interdisciplinaires de Formations Thématiques (GIFT) has made it possible to exploit the tremendous diversity of our training offer. Unprecedented objects, they bring together people with diverse backgrounds and expertise around a theme: aeronautics, big data, disability, the sea and maritime activities, aging, tourism, natural and industrial risks. Their aim: to create synergies for the benefit of students, and to move the world forward.