ÉCOLE POLYTECH N IQUEFÉDÉRALE DE LAUSAN N E

Michel Pouly EPFL-STI-LGPP Swiss Microtech

The European Research Academy (ERA)

Running EU cooperation projects

….some academic and industrialexperiences

ECOLEAD

The European Research Academy (ERA)

Agenda of the presentation

1. Researcher’s point of view2. Industrial partner’s point of view3. Conclusions

The European Research Academy (ERA)

1. Researcher’s point of view

The FP system of Calls :

• the projects must fit into the currently open Calls• competition is very tough• the Call description is very generic ►you must find out “what is behind”• the deadlines are short and must be respected

Use the Euresearch services to get previousinformation about future calls, brokerage events,alerts etc.

The European Research Academy (ERA)

How to be part of the game ?

1. Create your own project

Project proposals represent a lot of work, the new FP72 stages process is a large amelioration!

2. Join a strong roped party

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Some hurdles :

• Successful roped parties tend to replicate themselves and become closed clubs• Less opening for newcomers• Soccer team paradigm :

“Never change a winning team !”

Take care of your vitamin R relationship through publications, conferences, brokerage events etc. Bring complementary competences Use Euresearch alert service

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Personal involvement

1. During the project definition phase

EU projects have a substantial number of partners (7 – more than 20) : - cooperation with all of them is impossible - participate to 1-2 work packages with less partners (3-4) and well defined content

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Personal involvement

2. During the project running phase

- use a good mix of face to face and remote meetings (humans are social creatures) - be ready to prepare progress reports for the coordinator - the administrative burden is not really big if you are not the coordinator

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Added value of EU projects

1. Learn what other research groups do2. Be confronted to other points of views3. Discover cultural differences

Have a look outside of yourown academic ivory tower !

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Added value of EU projects

4. Incentive to be more performing5. A strong lever for publications (including journal ones) !

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Added value of EU projects

• Funding for 3- 4 years for research institutes and industry

• SME funded at 50-75%

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Agenda of the presentation

1. Researcher’s point of view2. Industrial partner’s point of view3. Conclusions

The European Research Academy (ERA)

Swiss Microtech (SMT) is a collaborative network of small SME supplying high precision mechanical parts and created in 2001

Goals :• better serve its customers by providing a large palette of products and services• addressing together markets and customers beyond the possibilities of each isolated SME• continuous improvement of its members

Why participating to an FP6 IP project ?

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Four main business challenges to solve :

- Knowledge management and sharing within SMT

- Exploiting the e-business opportunities

- Marketing of the Swiss Microtech brand name

- Improving the collaboration with a Chinese

partner network

using the corresponding ECOLEAD

IP project resultsECOLEAD

The European Research Academy (ERA)

• a lot of knowledge (technical and commercial) is generated within SMT and is well shared between the people who meet regularly• it is not the case at the other company levels between people who don’t know each other !

Use the ECOLEAD Bag of Assets Management tool developed by the University of Bremen to increase the exchange of knowledge at more company levels

First results positive, mentality change still necessary !

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Exploiting the e-business opportunities was a strategic goal in 2001 as major customers introduced e-procurement applications

Use the ECOLEAD CoFinder tool developed by the University of Ljubljana to crawl on selected websites and find the most interesting tenders

Results depending of the number of corresponding tender sites

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Marketing the SMT brand name

Strategic decision taken in 2005 : address together the US medical market under the SMT common brand

Why should potential customers choose SMT and not a competitor? Because of our broad competences palette, complementary profiles and large aggregated production capacities, of course…

A clear image of SMT must be communicated, but

- the members knew the other partners only partially- the coach had a better overview, but in his mind only

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For our customers :Find the needed competences definitions and check their availability

For our agents:Additionally, find which SMT members have the requested competences and capacities tobetter target their work

ODMS / PCMS tools developed by University of Amsterdam

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List of the competence of SMT, each SMT member and the Chinese network

Example : Competence “Milling”Type of product, dimensions (length, diameter), lot sizes, precision, type of material….Resources : machine and human resourcesCapability : actual free capacitiesConspicuity : certifications, past experiences

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SMT competences are availablefor our customers and agents through the ECOLEAD tools via our Website

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Strategic decision taken in 2005 : collaborate with a partnernetwork in China to outsource cheap and simple parts and add further production capacities without having to invest there

Experienced problems:- a lot of misunderstandings- totally explicit communication- too much time needed to get a quote

- Use ODMS to define common shared notions like norms, raw material definitions, tolerances, etc.

- Use the Negotiation Wizard developed by Uninova to reduce the time needed to get a quotation and document the reached agreements

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Agenda of the presentation

1. Researcher’s point of view2. Industrial partner’s point of view3. Conclusions

The European Research Academy (ERA)

FP projects for researchers :

• a rather long lasting source of funding• a way to be confronted to other scientists and create contacts• a publication multiplier

FP project for companies (SME) :

• access to a fantastic pool of R&D competences• a way to boost your innovation efforts• a source of funding for your R&D

SMT will participate again !

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Some other related programs you may consider too:

1. The “Research for the benefit of SME” framework

2. The Eureka program

3. The IMS initiative