Insights

Over 60 experts from industry met the European Commission and research representatives to share experiences about nano-enabled innovations, future markets, framework and investment needs.

The CTO Forum Finland event is again organised to enable Finnish technology leaders to meet each other and to hear the latest news within the Finnish technology scene in October 2014.

Many large corporations in Europe are going through a time of transformation. Economic circumstances drive corporations to reduce non-core activities and to seek more dynamic R&D networks to meet the future market needs. This is an opportunity for entrepreneurs.

Column in Kauppalehti by Pekka Koponen, May, 2014

The Industrial Technologies conference was organised for the third time in April 2014. The event took place in Athens during the Greek Presidency of the European Council, and gave an outlook to European and global developments and latest innovations in the fields of nano and biotechnology, advanced materials, and new production technologies. It was a tremendous success with over 1,300 participants from more than 60 countries around the world.  Spinverse had an important role as one of the main co-organisers of the event.

Spinverse and EIRMA, the European Industrial Research Management Association, have announced that they will launch the quest for Europe’s CTO of the Year 2014 in June. The CTO of the Year Award is to highlight the role of the most prominent leaders of technology-based growth, promoting innovations to renew European industry and to upturn competitive advantage.

FIMECC research programmes have already proven their strength as target-oriented public-private partnerships (PPP), capable of creating new solutions and implementing results effectively. Now a new wave of intensive research cooperation between academia and industry is brought alive through an industry-led FIMECC Breakthrough Materials Doctoral School. Built as a part of the FIMECC BSA and HYBRIDS programmes launched in the beginning of 2014, it will involve 22 doctoral students in its first phase. Focusing on fundamental scientific challenges and modelling, this multi-disciplinary group of young scientists with their senior advisors and international partners will tackle critical research questions set by the companies involved to build new solutions and relevant competence for the industry.

In the previous column ‘Large Cooperates Join SLUSH too!’ I regretted the absence of large corporations in SLUSH. There was an appreciable amount of feedback; for example, Kimmo Alkio reported he brought along the entire management group of Tieto to the event. Excellent!

Spinverse will team with eight European companies and research institutes in the EU-funded research and innovation project “IP4Plasma” in an effort to fight the second biggest killer among infectious diseases. The aim is to produce a highly sensitive tuberculosis test that will allow a diagnosis within minutes with costs as low as 1€ per test.