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Issue 03|
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Oktober 2008
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Greetings
This issue of the COMPERA newsletter informs you on the progress
that the COMPERA project has made towards further implementation of
its activities. These activities range from offering support to
managers of Competence
Research Centres (CRCs) in the management of their
centres to activities focused on improvement of the support
measures of the funding agencies/ministries. In this context
COMPERA aims also to stimulate the international cooperation both
on the level of funding agencies/ministries as well as the CRCs
that are funded by these agencies/ministries.
In particular, this newsletter focuses on the new joint activities:
the toolbox for CRC managers (to be launched soon), the COMPERA
conference with focus on CRC policies and international
co-operation, and a joint study between the COMPERA-partners on international
collaborations between CRCs. In addition, you will find an update
on the on-going activities like the CRC-website, the results of the
workshop for CRC-managers on long-term strategies, new partners in
the COMPERA network and relevant national news from our partners
We hope that the information in this newsletter is of interest to
you. We are looking forward to meet you through our e-tools or in
person at one of our events. Please contact us if you have any comments or
questions or if you would like to have your news listed in our next
issue or website.
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01 Toolbox for CRCs available soon
The COMPERA team is currently working on a toolbox for CRCs. This
is a compilation of good practice examples, references and links on
topics such as :
• Governance and research management
• Monitoring and evaluation
• Public awareness and Public Relations
• International Co-operation
• Public Private Partnerships and
• IPR issues.
A first version of the toolbox will be available in early October.
To check its functionality, we will send it around selected CRCs
and ask them to comment on it. If you are interested in this
consultation process, please contact us under compera@iwt.be. As a further step we will
publish the toolbox on the COMPERA website. The integration of a
discussion board is also in preparation.
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02 International conference on CRC
Programmes and Policies
On Tuesday 3 February 2009 COMPERA will organize a conference on Competence
Research Centre programmes and policies in Düsseldorf (Germany).
The conference will be organised in cooperation with the CREST working group on industry-led CRCs.
The event aims to bring together programme managers and policy
makers in the field of CRCs to discuss and exchange views. The
topics of the conference focus on good practices with the set up
and management of programmes for CRCs, international cooperation
and views on future perspectives of CRCs in the European innovation
landscape.
More information on this event, including the programme, will be
soon available on the COMPERA website, If you would like to
receive further information and the programme by e-mail, please
inform us : luebbers@vdi.de
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03 Joint tender for study on international
co-operation between CRCs
The COMPERA consortium will start soon a new joint activity. Nine
COMPERA partners have agreed to co-fund a study that should identify
the state of the art, needs and perspectives regarding the
international co-operation of Competence Research Centres. The
study will allow the identification, in a structured way, of the
needs and opportunities that exist at the level of the CRCs regarding
international co-operation (including co-operation with other
CRCs). It will also address barriers, if any, that exist at the
level of the funding agencies and Ministries to respond to these
needs/opportunities.
read more ...
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04 Successful workshop on long-term
strategies for CRCs
On 5th March 2008 COMPERA organised a workshop for CRC-managers to
discuss their opinions and challenges on long-term strategies of
CRCs for durability. The aim of the workshop was to exchange views
and experiences on this difficult topic and to support managers in
their set-up and implementation of their CRCs long-term strategy.
Five CRC-managers presented their long-term strategies and its
implementation. These presentations were followed by an interactive
discussion between the participants of the workshop. The
presentations as well as an overview of the overall conclusions of
the workshop are available on the COMPERA-website.
read more...
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05 Evaluation of
COMPERA Website completed
The core content of the COMPERA website addresses the core needs of
the CRCs represented in COMPERA. CRCs are mainly interested in finding
new partners, becoming more visible and getting to know the
CRC-landscape in their field of innovation (see figure). This is
the main outcome of the COMPERA website evaluation that took place
in July and August this year. 61 CRCs sent us completely filled-in
questionnaires - an impressive response rate regarding the vacation
period during which the evaluation took place.

read more...
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06
New partners in COMPERA :
- VDI/VDE Innovation + Technik (Germany)
VDI/VDE Innovation + Technik GmbH
(VDI/VDE-IT, www.vdivde-it.de) is a company founded by the VDI (Association of
German Engineers) and the VDE (Association for Electrical,
Electronic & Information Technologies), two of the biggest
science and technology associations in Europe. VDI/VDE-IT
manages various innovation programmes related to R&D,
among which the initiative "Networks of Competence
Germany" by the Federal Ministry of Economics and
Technology. VDI-VDE joined COMPERA to become an integral part
of the ongoing process of creating a European research area on
the level of competence centres. It is the goal to exchange
the different European concepts of networking and clustering
the scientific and technological expertise and - by learning
from each other - to develop innovation tools that will be
beneficial for the participating programmes.
read more...
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07 Trans-European call for proposals
focussing on internationalisation for technology clusters and SMEs
In April 2008 the INNET project launched its first pilot call
"Innovation Express". This call aims to foster the support
for innovation activities between European clusters and/or between
SMEs belonging to these clusters. The activities of the projects
should focus on identifying, initiating, or developing a
trans-European co-operation in view of increasing the clusters
future joint innovation support or research, development and
innovation activity. The call will be open until the end of 2008.
The call documents and the submission guidelines are available on the
INNET-website.
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08 CREST working group on industry-led
competence centres
In December 2007 a CREST (Committee for Scientific and Technical
Research) OMC Expert Working Group was mandated to work and report
on Industry-led Competence Centres, collecting the EU Member States
approaches to the key aspects of establishing and managing
competence centres with a view to developing recommendations on
best practice. Ireland was selected to Chair the group, and the
agency responsible is Enterprise Ireland. Work began in February
2008 and the final report is due for December 2008.
read more...
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09 News from the
COMPERA partners :
- Process started to establish Norwegian Centres for
Environment-friendly Energy Research (Norway)
A new Norwegian scheme “Centres for Environment-friendly
Energy Research” (CEER) seeks to develop expertise and promote
innovation through focus on long-term research in selected areas
of environment-friendly energy, transport and CO2 management
in close co-operation between prominent research communities
and users.
Read more...
- COMET - 2nd Call for Competence Centres (Austria)
The competence centre programme COMET supports the building up
of competence centres with a research programme jointly
formulated by science and industry. The 1st Call allowed
funding for 3 K2-Centres, 11 K1 Centres and 6 K Projects with
a total of 125 million Euro federal funding. A 2nd call for
all 3 programme lines is planned end of 2008, with an expected
federal budget of about 125 Mio Euro. The selection procedure
for K1/K2 Centres is based on a two stage procedure.
K-Projects are selected in one stage. Participation of foreign
partners is possible on certain conditions.
Read more...
- VINNOVA’s Focus on Impact: now available in English
(Sweden)
This report describes the VINNOVA ambitions and activities
that aim to understanding and increasing the effects of the
VINNOVA commitment to research, innovation and sustainable
growth in Sweden. The report briefly describes the different
processes used by VINNOVA to secure the quality in the
alignment and implementation from an impact perspective.
However, the report focuses on the descriptions of and
conclusions from the impact analysis made by VINNOVA since the
start in 2001. From an international perspective, certain
aspects are unique. The report is now available in English at http://www.vinnova.se/In-English/Publications/VINNOVA-Analysis.
Two preliminary figures : impact
measurement scheme and time-based
evolution of impact logic assessment.
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