Info Day @ Cyprus

EIT Manufacturing Athens Hub (CLC South East) hosts successful first Info Day in Cyprus

On the 3^rd of April 2023, EIT Manufacturing CLC South East and CYENS Center of Excellence co-organised a successful event in Cyprus aimed at getting to know the cyprian ecosystem, its challenges and update attendants about EIT Manufacturing activities along with some success stories of cooperation with EIT Manufacturing. The event “EIT Manufacturing Info Day @ Cyprus”, which was held at the A.G. Leventis Gallery in Nicosia, Cyprus, brought together key players in the manufacturing industry, experts, university personnel and policymakers to discuss ways of enhancing collaborations and partnerships to drive innovation and growth.

The event featured a lineup of distinguished speakers, who shared their insights and experiences on various topics related to the manufacturing industry. The event was divided in 5 parts: The first part, the welcome session, Mr. Loukas Papagiannis, Municipal Councilor Municipality of Nicosia, explained the recent developments of the Municipality in manufacturing and innovation. Furthermore, Prof. Yiorgos Chrysanthou, Research Director of CYENS, Mr. Klaus Beetz, CEO of EIT Manufacturing, and Dr. Niki Kousi, Managing Director of CLC South East, gave their welcome speech along with some information about CYENS and EIT Manufacturing’s activities in Europe and South East accordingly.

The second part consisted of a short but rich presentation about the Cyprian research and innovation ecosystem by Mr. Theodoros Loukaidis, Director at Research and Innovation Foundation. In this part a first mapping of priorities and the current situation of the ecosystem in Cyprus was presented.

The third part was a presentation of all the aspects of EIT Manufacturing. A detailed presentation of the open calls and services from CLC South East was given by Aristeidis Katsiorchis, Innovation Manager at CLC South East. Furthermore, an introduction to RIS programs and opportunities as well as the presentation of xKIC-SRI Cluster activities were also given by Veronica Rodriguez, EIT Manufacturing RIS Operation Manager and Marta Kaczmarek, Director of the EIT Community’s strategic Regional Innovation Projects, accordingly, noting that as Cyprus is one of the RIS countries, it can be positively affected by the cooperation with EIT Manufacturing.

In the fourth part, success stories from CLC South East’s partners in Bulgaria (CLEANTECH), Romania (ICEBERG+) and Greece (LMS) took place, remarking the significance of collaborating with EIT Manufacturing and the benefits that arise. Thinker Maker Space Manager, Marios Constantinides, also gave a thorough presentation about the prototypes developed at the company.

Finally, the interactive workshop took place in the end of the event, which helped EIT Manufacturing map the needs, difficulties, and strengths of the Cyprian ecosystem, in order to find the solutions and collaborate with partners to succeed in overcoming the challenges.

The event was successful in highlighting the need for stronger connections and collaborations between Cyprian companies, universities, and RTOs with pan-european counterparts. The outcome of the event was that Cyprian stakeholders in the manufacturing industry are keen to forge stronger ties with their pan-european counterparts to drive commercialisation, enhance innovation, and lower trade costs. They expressed their desire for more support and funding to enable them to collaborate effectively with other european companies and leverage their expertise. After the event, Cyprian stakeholders in the manufacturing industry were more determined to establish and maintain connections with their Central European counterparts for commercialization of their products and develop innovation in Cyprus.