Project manager: Secretary General, Peter Göranson, NORDTEK
Background
Nordtek is a network between the Rectors and Deans of the Technical Universities in the five Nordic countries. To be a member you have to have an education in advanced engineering up to Master level and PhD- education in the technical research field. All the Nordic universities who fulfil these requirements are members. The members represent 23 Universities, more than 100.000 students, teachers and researchers.
This summary outlines initial activities in establishing a new Nordic network – “The NORDTEK-Knowledge Triangle project”- supported by Nordic Council of Ministers. The network aims to support and initiate the establishment of knowledge triangles with respect to research, education and innovation through bringing together Nordic participants from industry, academia and the public sector.
The NORDTEK Knowledge Triangle project is divided into two subprojects:
- Knowledge Triangle in Welfare Technology
- Knowledge Triangle in Design.
A short description of these follow below.
Welfare Technology
Project leader: Director, Head of Department, The Maersk Mc-Kinney Moller Institute Kasper Hallenborg, PhD. hallenborg@mmmi.sdu.dk , The Maersk Mc-Kinney Moller Institute, University of Southern Denmark
Background
The demographic challenges in the developed countries including the Nordic countries play an important role not only at the political level. It also directly or indirectly affects many other parts of our society from the educational level to business development and opportunities for future growth and export.
The institutions of the NORDTEK network, which educate students at the Masters level of engineering, has a natural focus on combining applied research with education and innovation that fits well with welfare technology.
Objective
The aim of the network is to strengthen collaboration and share information among the members of the NORDTEK network, and in general to stress the importance of joint work and participation in e.g. European projects among Nordic organizations.
The NORDTEK network of welfare and assistive technologies is built on the concepts of the triangle of knowledge, which focus on education, research and innovation, and the interplay between them.
Target group
The stakeholders – users, companies and public institutions – will be involved in the seminars/workshops through ongoing collaborations between the members and national stakeholders.
Activities
Through workshops and seminars members of the NORDTEK network will exchange experience and information on welfare technologies, and coordinate and strengthen the collaboration among the Nordic educational institutions. There will be a particular focus on different aspects of the triangle of knowledge and their interplay, e.g. research/innovation and education/research.
Initially, the project will conduct and present the outcome of a research with the purpose of identifying telehealth ICT infrastructure initiatives that are based on international recognized standards in the Nordic countries. Furthermore the barriers related to the usage of international standards will be discussed.
We intend to collaborate with other networks engaged with similar topics as Welfare Technology and ICT.
Seminars will bring together the majority of network members in discussions on on-going projects, needs etc. and aim to be a meeting point for elaboration of a wide range of topics.Workshops will focus on defined topics of specific interest to network members and will feature in which participants will explore possible applications of state of the art methodology etc.
Results
Publications from the network’s events will be posted here.
NORDTEK Welfare Technology Project members:
Project leader:
Director, Ph.D., Head of Department Kasper Hallenborg, The Maersk Mc-Kinney Moller Institute, hallenborg@mmmi.sdu.dk, University of Southern Denmark
Project Group:
Professor Arne Krokan arne.krokan@svt.ntnu.no – Department of Sociology and Political – Norwegian University of Science and Technology – Trondheim, Norway
Project Researcher Matti Linnavuo matti.linnavuo@aalto.fi – School of Electrical Engineering, Department of Electronics – Aalto University, Finland
Professor Gerd Johansson gerd.johansson@design.lth.se Faculty of Engineering, Ergonomics and Aerosol Technology, Lund University Sweden
Senior Lecturer Runar Unnthorsson runson@hi.is – Industrial Engineering – Centre for Productivity, Performance and Processes – School of Engineering and Natural Sciences, University of Iceland
Network coordinator:
Conny Heidtmann cohe@mmmi.sdu.dk The Maersk Mc-Kinney Moller Institute, University of Southern Denmark
Design
Project leader: Associate Prof. Anders Warell, PhD. anders.warell@design.lth.se / Viktor Hiort af Ornäs, PhD. viktor.hiort@design.lth.se , Division of Industrial Design, Lund University
Background
The new network will bring together participants from the NORDTEK institutions, industry and societal organisations around research, education and innovation related to design. Aesthetics, sustainability and user centred design are important aspects in this work. An explicit aim is to create conditions for future initiation of mutual research and innovation projects, connecting a variety of actors and stimulating mobility. Particularly, collaboration initiatives integrating the interests of industry and academia, supported by a mobility programme, will be encouraged and facilitated through the network.
Many of the academic network members are based at technical faculties, which will affect the focus of the network. Central areas of mutual interest may include structured methods and systematic approaches for addressing design related issues in product– and process development, and the development and transfer of knowledge between the various actors of the network.
Experiences from other networks such as Nordcode, the Nordic Network on Communicative Product Design (www.nordcode.net), has shown that it is important to build personal relations by bringing together participants shared activities, preferably with some continuity.
Activities
Actual activities will be specified in dialogue with network members, particularly the members of the Steering Group, in order to best meet needs related to the formation of knowledge triangles. It is however possible to foresee at least two types of events to be organised within the network
- Yearly seminars. These will bring together the majority of network members in discussions on on-going projects, needs etc. and aim to be a meeting point for elaboration of a wide range of topics.
- Special Interest Group (SIG) Workshops. These will focus on defined topics of specific interest to network members and will feature expert tutorials and workshops in which participants will explore possible applications of state of the art methodology. We foresee that a number of SIGs will be active simultaneously throughout the duration of the network. All SIGs are expected to meet common events, thus facilitating collaboration and transparency between SIGs. Targeted collaborative projects (with participants from academia, industry, organisations, in any constellation) are likely to spring out of the work of each respective SIG.
The initial activities in the project aim to establish the network and create a basic platform for dialogue and exchange.
An important task of the network will be to initiate activities and projects, which will enable the network to live independently beyond the initial three years of funding.
Results
Publications from the network’s events will be posted here.
Contact
Nordtek Design Steering group Sweden (network coordination): Anders Warell, Lund University, anders.warell@design.lth.se Viktor Hiort, Lund University, viktor.hiort@design.lth.se Denmark: Torben Lenau, Technical University of Denmark, lenau@mek.dtu.dk Finland: Tero Juuti, Tampere University of Technology, tero.juuti@tut.fi Iceland: Magnus Thor Jonsson, University of Iceland, magnusj@hi.is Norway: Andre Liem, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, andre.liem@ntnu.no