Taking the Bavarian Vir tual University (Virtuelle Hochschule Bayern) as an example, the author shows that the innovative potential of vir tual universities lies in the idea of a cooperation of utterly different universities, with teaching staff from different faculties, schools and backgrounds. Bringing these divergent elements together, notably in the question of a mutual acknowledgement of credits issued by each university, is one of the most ambitious aims of the Virtuelle Hochschule Bay…