KNOWLEDGE, INNOVATION, PROFIT

The closing conference of the University Innovation Ecosystem competition ’From Knowledge to Business - Utilisation of Knowledge Assets at the University of Miskolc’ was organised by the University of Miskolc's Centre for Advanced Materials and Intelligent Technologies for Higher Education and Industrial Cooperation on the occasion of the 4th Innovation Day. The meeting was the final event of a three and a half year programme, which presented the achievements of the university.

At the meeting, Dr. László Lengyel, Deputy President of the National Research, Development and Innovation Office summarized the objectives and national results of the programme. He said that 22 Hungarian universities had launched University Innovation Ecosystem projects, to which a total of HUF 4.4 billion had been allocated. He made an important announcement: a new call for proposals is expected, so higher education institutions can continue to work on the continuation of the programme and the development of the results achieved. In addition, the new Market R&D calls for proposals are expected to be launched by the end of the summer, and are eagerly awaited by innovative companies and universities alike.

Fast administration, unified proposal management and project management support the efficient operation of the R&D&I system at the University of Miskolc, which was greatly helped by the introduction of the General Terms and Conditions for R&D&I services. Several contributors to the conference programme confirmed that this has helped to speed up and unify the RDI processes at the university.

At the conference, the leaders of the automotive companies of the region - Bosch, ZF Hungaria, GKN Automotive - shared their thoughts on the current and future challenges of the automotive industry, the experiences and opportunities of RDI cooperation with the University of Miskolc. László Fükő, Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Universitas Miskolcinensis Foundation, which maintains the University, was one of the participants of the discussion and also spoke as the head of the North Hungarian Automotive Cluster.

Following the conference, 12 university laboratories opened their doors to visitors, mainly in areas of interest to the automotive industry. During the laboratory visits, researchers from the University presented their equipment and the technical problems they are currently working on.