Links:
Co-Location
Co-location allows for the efficient use of industry and university personnel and resources in a shared space where collaborative research is carried out based on an agreed long term strategic vision. The use of a common space enables a daily basis interaction and reduces communication and cultural barriers associated with being located in different facilities.
Goal:
Analyze the main bottlenecks taking place in several joint activities and identify best practices to increase the long-term efficiency, societal impact and throughput of University-Industry partnerships.
Approach:
- Share strategic vision on research projects and exploitable results.
- Conduct joint research projects and educational activities in a shared space.
- Monitor the interaction, analyze results and ask stakeholders´ experience to come up with new approaches.
Results:
Identify best practices that solve the main bottlenecks found during the shared experience, focused on:
- Co-located team: How to increase trust and motivate personnel.
- Processes: Define an easier and faster market validation process of new research ideas.
- Output: How to increase the number of impactful joint innovation opportunities and industry-ready skilled students.
Four initial guidelines for a successful Co-Location:
- Embrace the different nature and asymmetries of companies and universities in terms of structure, processes, timings, objectives, commercialization vs dissemination/publication objectives.
- Define a sufficiently detailed agreement to support processes, but flexible enough to incorporate new activities.
- Train staff well and involve the required resources that enable an agile interaction.
- Be ready to exploit the results of the collaboration and continuously improve the interaction.
