EcoTech 2024: Research Universities as Hubs for Eco-Systems

While the classic approach to research at universities is based on public funding (sometimes augmented by philanthropic sources), there is an increasing amount of research which is funded by industry, including multinational corporations. Funding of this nature has unique advantages and disadvantages, and its optimized utilization can increase the impact on society by modern research universities.

At the same time, academy-industry research includes challenges related to intellectual property (IP) rights, reporting and publishing, and the involvement of students. The review process is not equal to competitive research, and it is often difficult to maintain the balance between research, development, and engineering. However, the added value to industry combined with the innovative approach often found at research universities can be worth the effort required to promote this form of collaboration.

Recent years have seen increased efforts by research universities to form companies based on IP developed during the course of research.  Forming new “startup companies” has unique advantages compared to licensing IP to existing industry and has been demonstrated to significantly increase employment opportunities.

In order to properly define these challenges, to review solutions currently in use, and to learn about new avenues for enabling collaboration between academia and industry, it has been decided to hold the international conference EcoTech 2024.

The conference will look deeper into university – industry collaboration challenges, review solutions currently in use, and learn about new avenues for enabling collaboration between academia and industry.