Researchers in Europe and Australia will have the opportunity to spend from one month to up to a year in Australia and in several European countries including Austria, Croatia, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Slovenia, UK and Spain.
The exchange opportunities are through OpenInnoTrain - a new €2.5M research project focused on open innovation and research translation between university and industry with a 22-member research consortium with partners from several countries.
The project aims to enable the untapped potential of European university researchers in getting their research outcomes to the market within the University?Industry Cooperation (UIC) framework.
This Open Innovation approach for research translation is the prerequisite for societal impact through value creation by embedding research?generated knowledge into practices, transforming knowledge made available in academic publications to new or improved products and services and behavioural changes.
OpenInnoTrain works in the sectors of FinTech (a new financial industry that applies technology to improve or innovate financial services), Industry 4.0 (the digitalisation of the manufacturing industries that results in fully integrated, automated and optimised production flows), CleanTech (a range of low carbon technologies aimed at providing solutions to environmental problems) and FoodTech (the application of advanced technologies such as embedded computing and robotics to food production, packaging and distribution).
OpenInnoTrain is funded by the European Commission's prestigious Horizon 2020 research and innovation scheme and it was recently launched at the European hub of RMIT University in Barcelona.
This is the first project that connects European and Australian research at this scale within such a global network of industrial partners and academic institutions.
Professor Anne-Laure Mention, Project Coordinator and Director of RMIT's Global Business Innovation Enabling Capability Platform, said OpenInnoTrain will see the funding of up to 540 person-months of scientific exchanges over four years.
"The exchanges will be designed to facilitate the creation of an international and inter-sectoral network of both research centres as well as industry partners for knowledge development and sharing," Mention said.
"The four contemporary areas of FinTech, Industry 4.0, CleanTech and FoodTech will be in focus.
"In addition to exchanges, the project will also include workshops, summer schools, masterclasses, seminars and hackathons at RMIT's European hub in Barcelona as well as in different locations across Europe with project partners.
"At the core of the project is to foster better ways for academia and industry to work together to translate research into products and services that benefit society.
"We're excited at this opportunity to bring together global experts from research centres, industry groups and universities to make a real and positive difference to our communities." Mention said.
###
More information about OpenInnoTrain can be found at: http://openinnotrain.eu/
Follow us on Twitter: @OpenInnoTrain
For project queries: Prof. Anne-Laure Mention, anne-laure.mention@rmit.edu.au
For interviews and general media queries: Karen Matthews, karen.matthews@rmit.edu.au
OpenInnoTrain is a Marie Skodowska-Curie Research and Innovation Staff Exchange, funded by the European Union's Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation program, Grant Agreement number 823971. This document reflects only the author's view and the European Union is not liable for any use that may be made of the information contained therein.