Several European countries have made it possible for public universities to become foundation universities. The transformation has also involved a change in their governance model with external actors taking important decision-making positions. We believe that these changes also imply a transformation of the organisational culture of the said universities. This study examines the transformation of a Finnish and a Hungarian university into a foundation one based on documents, interviews and questionnaire surveys. We found that for both universities there is strong pressure to move towards a corporate culture, but that change is not happening without resistance at either university.