The UPC joins the EIT Manufacturing knowledge and innovation community
The UPC in other KICs
The UPC is a founding partner of the EIT knowledge and innovation communities EIT InnoEnergy—being a formal partner since 2010—and EIT Urban Mobility—a core partner since 2018. It has the highest partner status on both, which is comparable to its newly acquired status on EIT Manufacturing.
Within EIT InnoEnergy the UPC has created five master’s programmes and participated in more than 30 international research projects with industry partners in the field of energy. The University has also played a prominent role in two innovation projects and in preliminary research to evaluate technology-based business ideas.
And within EIT Urban Mobility it has engaged in educational projects such as the master’s degree in EIT Urban Mobility—active since the 2020-2021 academic year—and other research and innovation projects, such as eUltimate, Women in Urban Mobility (WUM) and LogiSmile.
Additionally, in 2022 the UPC became an associate partner of EIT Raw Materials—having been a project partner since 2017—and EIT Culture & Creativity. It has also acted as a partner in several EIT Health-funded projects. These collaborations have yielded projects in the areas of materials science, such as InnoLOG and Blue Harvesting, and healthcare, such as ABLE Exoskeleton and EXPERT3D. Last but not least, the UPC has also collaborated in the 2022 New European Bauhaus (NEB) Citython, promoted by EIT Climate.
Current projects that have been launched as a result of collaboration between EIT Manufacturing partners include TF KnowNet – A modern Teaching Factory, Zero Defect: AI and Big Data to predict quality defects – and save raw materials and Perform – Industry 4.0 demonstrator.
The UPC has joined EIT Manufacturing, Europe’s largest manufacturing innovation network. Promoted by the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT), it pursues the digitalisation of industry in the context of circular economy.
Mar 15, 2023
EIT Manufacturing is a knowledge and innovation community (KIC) of the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT) that boasts 130 members, bringing together Europe’s leading manufacturing players. This innovation ecosystem includes European universities such as Aalto University, Chambers University of Technology, the Università di Bologna and the Politecnico di Torino, and large companies such as Atos, Procter & Gamble, Volvo, Volkswagen and Whirlpool.
Europe’s manufacturing sector employs nearly 30 million people in 2.1 million companies and accounts for almost 20% of total GDP. It must deal with rapid technological advances and the need for a more circular economy. To meet these challenges, EIT Manufacturing offers a knowledge environment in which new opportunities for innovation are created to move forward in the digitalisation of the sector and foster sustainable manufacturing. By 2030, the network plans to start over a thousand companies across Europe, creating new job opportunities.
Advanced manufacturing encompasses implementing and using technologies to improve and optimise the manufacturing process: from product design and raw materials handling to production automation, collaborative robotics, system integration and IoT implementation. Advanced manufacturing adds value to all value chain stages and thus results in improved end products.
New opportunities for research and innovation
The Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya - BarcelonaTech (UPC) has joined the San Sebastian-based Co-location Center West—one of six EIT Manufacturing hubs—as a member, a category comprising large companies, research institutes and universities. With its significant scientific output in advanced manufacturing and Industry 4.0, the UPC will provide internationally renowned research and innovation expertise.
By becoming a member of EIT Manufacturing new opportunities open up for the UPC in terms of research, innovation and teaching. Strengthening ties with digital innovation centres, clusters, industry associations, regional governments and accelerators will allow the University to secure funding by partnering with key financial institutions on a national and European scale to file new patents and turn research into solutions and innovation for the market.
An added advantage will be participating in academic and networking activities with other leading universities in the manufacturing sector, industry key players and governments, which may lead to new or stronger collaborations.
Upon announcing the incorporation of the UPC as a new member, managing director of EIT Manufacturing West Antoni Pijoan explained: “As the top technological university in Spain and among the top 20 in Europe, with nearly 30,000 students distributed in 65 bachelor’s degrees, 84 master’s degrees (three of them specialised in manufacturing) and 45 doctoral programmes, the UPC brings EIT Manufacturing into a new level specially within the Western European development ecosystem.”
Pijoan also highlighted that the UPC “has a strong background on continuous education (more than 270 programmes) as well as a custom programme to bring technology to market, which managed to create 11 start-ups last year. On top of that, the UPC has a long track record with other EIT communities—being an active member on six of them—and is strongly tied with most of the current EIT Manufacturing members.”
