In 2014 the Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences (AUAS) started the first of many area-based living lab (called ‘AUAS fieldlabs’) in collaboration with the district municipality, introducing an area-based innovation approach to local challenges like unemployment, poverty or a healthy neighborhood (Lab Amsterdam, Majoor et al., 2017). For each challenge, the living lab brought together local entrepreneurs, NGOs and citizens. This multilevel structure was devised to connect change at local policy level to innovation at a practical service level. In addition to the area-based living labs, the AUAS co-founded several new living labs varying in size, subject and scale, which all share characteristics of so-called system innovation initiatives. They consist of a cohesive set of experiments by a multi-actor innovation network to contribute to a process of sustainable structural change in dominant structures, relations and practices while interacting with the system.