Monday, 7/31/2017
The Fibrenamics Green
platform of the University of Minho (UMinho) promoted a creativity contest within
the creative community entitled “Green Think Tank”. The initiative has come to
an end on the 21st July 2017, with the winner’s announcement (Pedro
Regadas and Sónia Soeiro).
The
Green Think Tank (GTT) is a community of the UMinho’s Fibrenamics Green
platform that brings together professionals from multidisciplinary areas linked
to the creative industries through the sharing of
ideas. The main goal of the contest was to develop an innovative
waste-based product, which was composed of two challenges – one linked to
fibers and the other to wood. The “Fiber challenge” aimed the development of an
innovative product based on the «Fiber» demonstrator project, which is based on
fibrous waste. On the other hand, the “Wood challenge” aimed the creation of a
product – equally with innovative characteristics – that contemplated wood
waste.
This sharing of ideas and knowledge can be done through the UMinho’s
platform for the community and vice-versa, as Raul Fangueiro, professor at the
School of Engineering of the University of Minho (EEUM) and contest coordinator
explained: “The GTT creative community has the autonomy to also launch ideas
for the GTT partner group. If the community has a designer with an interesting
idea, this member can present the idea and we – as animators of the Fibrenamics
Green – will find the chain of companies that are capable of carrying out this
future product”.
The contest aimed to choose the best proposal for each of the challenges
proposed, according to criteria related to innovation, creativity,
sustainability and technical feasibility, as well as to contribute to the
dissemination and awareness of creative production in Portugal. “These
initiatives always aim to create synergies among several areas of knowledge. I
believe that the EEUM has a relevant role regarding the placing of science on
the market”, the researcher highlighted.
The GTT community allowed all its members to have access to privileged
information, opportunities for contact with business networks, participate in
creative workshops and contests for ideas and challenges. The next GTT contest
will be about plastics and mineral waste and will start in September 2017.
The Fibrenamics Green counts with a total funding of 550 thousand euros,
85% being from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and the Norte 2020
Programme.
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info: http://green.fibrenamics.com/green-think-tank/
