OpenInnoTrain Final Event

The OpenInnoTrain Final Event took place from 25th until 27th June 2024, in person, in the lovely city of Porto (Portugal). 

Partners from around Europe and Australia were gathered to celebrate the success stories within OpenInnoTrain. The event was a combination of interesting sessions, workshops, panel discussions and presentations. With close to 50 participants, the Final Event was a fantastic opportunity for all attendees to discuss new collaborations and reflect upon the many success stories of the OpenInnoTrain project. 

The event started with an introduction from OpenInnoTrain's Chief Investigator Prof. Anne-Laure Mention (RMIT University). She presented an overview of the project's status, including the final numbers of secondments, publications and events held. She then followed with an overview of WP1. 

The second session of the day was conducted by each Work Package Leaderr: Tor Helge Aas (University of Agder) started presenting the updates from WP2 (FinTech), Georg Macher (TU Graz) proceeded with WP3 (Industry 4.0) on behalf of Marina Dabic. Mona Enell-Nilsson (University of Vaasa) followed with her presentation of WP4 (CleanTech)'s highlights, and Meriam Trabelsi (University of Siena) concluded the round with the updates from WP5 (FoodTech) on behalf of Elena Casprini. 

After lunch, we had the pleasure to listen to Guest Speaker Michel Kalika on the “impact of the DBA". Prof. Mention joined him with a final fireside chat that ended with some questions from the audience. 

The fantastic session was followed by an emotional and insightful “Secondee Panel", facilitated by Kerry O'Connor (RMIT University). Secondees Heini Pensar (University of Vaasa), Nicolas Diaz Ferreyra (Hamburg University of Technology), Meriam Trabelsi (University of Siena), Raphael Stanzani (UPTEC), Sanja Smiljic (University of Agder / University of South-Eastern Norway) and Andreu Catala Mallofre (Polytechnic University of Catalonia) joined and discussed their diverse secondment experiences, including how this project helped them professionally and personally. The panel conversation ended up being a platform to reflect on the positive impact of the OpenInnoTrain project towards individuals and organisations. 

The afternoon sessions concluded with a “HORIZON EUROPE Opportunities" Presentation by Bruno Woeran, in which partners could start thinking about potential new paths for collaboration and the creation of new projects. 

As the event was taking place at the lovely World Of Wine (WOW) in Porto, participants took advantage of the location and the group was divided into two to visit two of the museums in the complex: the Wine Experience and the Planet Cork.

The day finalized with a lovely “Welcome Dinner" in the beautiful area of Foz.  

The second day of the event started with a more administrative perspective, but equally important for all partners. Marianne Blusi and Mona Enell-Nilsson shared their experiences from the recent Audit that the European Commission conducted for our project at the University of Vaasa. Project Coordinator Elia Vallejos also joined them to remind the partners about reporting obligations and the preparation of the Final Report. 

After a brief coffee break, it was time to hear about the actual research of our secondees. Facilitated by Elia Vallejos, eight different secondees took the stage to pitch the research they conducted during their secondments. The presenters included: Bianca Banica (INESC TEC), Gergana Romanova (University of Copenhagen), Tamara Leon Oviedo (Polytechnic University of Catalonia), Petri Helo (University of Vaasa), Elena Pessot (University of Siena), Rumy Narayan (University of Vaasa), Nicolas Diaz Ferreyra (Hamburg University of Technology) and Rathan Alagirisamy (University of Vaasa). The pitches were done “Pecha Kucha" style, in which they had 5 slides and 5 minutes to present them. The secondees delivered impressive pitches, touching very different areas such as logistics, food technology, university-industry collaborations, citizen engagement,  social innovation or technical debt. 

The afternoon of the second day was divided by two session presented by Jakob Feldfos  Christensen, from DiversiUNITY, in which attendees learned about the importance of diversity and inclusion in research projects. 

To conclude the second day, participants joined a lovely Port Wine Tasting, followed by the Consortium Dinner. 

The final day started with an interesting Panel Session around Entrepreneurial Ecosystems in Portugal. The session included panel members Luís Seca, Member of the Board of Directors at INESC TEC; Antonio Dias Martins, Executive Director at Startup Portugal; Maria Moura Oliveira, Business Director at UPTEC; and Carlos Carvalho, CEO at Adyta and Board Member of ANJE.
The panel was moderated by Prof. Anne-Laure Mention, OpenInnoTrain Chief Investigator.

Before moving to the interesting discussions on “proposal development" that Bruno Woeran facilitated, continuing from the first conversations from Tuesday; Prof. Mention delivered some awards and special commendations to OpenInnoTrain Partners and Secondees. Such commendations included “most secondments to academia", recognizing Mona Enell-Nilsson's contributions from the University of Vaasa in providing the opportunity of secondments to researchers, and “Longest Secondment and fist Cotutelle graduate" to secondee Sanja Smiljic, among many others. 

The event was, overall, a huge success and a fantastic opportunity for OpenInnoTrain partners and secondees to reflect upon the opportunities that this project brought and will bring, as well as to move forward discussing new forms of collaboration.