- 8 Knowledge Transfer Experiments will receive support and will be financed with up to €200,000 in equity free funding.
- The consortiums composed by a manufacturing company, an artist and a technology supplier participating in Better Factory will begin their digitalisation journey, as part of the framework of the Horizon 2020 programme of the European Commission.
- The top 3 countries with most of the applications were Italy (16), Romania (15) and the Netherlands (12).
The Better Factory initiative, funded under the European Commission H2020 programme, aims to help European manufacturers become more competitive in the global market by providing up to 200K EUR in equity-free funding to develop and deploy collaborative intra-factory experiments.
Manufacturing Companies will discover new business models and digitise their factories to match the production of new or personalised products, thanks to the collaboration with Artists and Technology Suppliers during the lifetime of the Better Factory project and beyond.
After the success of the First Expression of Interest round where more than 350 applications were received, the applicants went through a matchmaking process supported by the Better Factory consortia.
Finally, 23 teams that followed this process submitted their experiments proposals for one of the eight available spots to become a Knowledge Transfer Experiment (KTE). The final 15 already formed teams also submitted their applications for a total of 38 global submissions for this First Open Call.
The next steps
For the next stage of our initiative, the teams composed of one manufacturing company, one artist, and one technology supplier (Knowledge Transfer Experiments – KTEs) will be matched with their respective mentors. The following experts will be allocated for each team:
- Technical mentors will guide the technical implementation of the KTEs, provide expertise for resolving technical issues and ensure that the solution is beyond the current state-of-the-art. Whenever needed, they will allocate additional researchers from the Better Factory consortium members to the KTEs to fill technological gaps.
- Art mentors will provide crucial support in guiding Artists to develop creative solutions (e.g. designs) that provide real value in addressing the proposed challenges.
- Business mentors will support in developing a business plan for the further exploitation of the KTEs results beyond the KTEs to ensure their long-term sustainability. The business support will focus on ensuring the differentiation and value proposition of the KTEs’ achievements.
After the matching process, the KTEs will be able to start developing their solutions aimed to transform the Manufacturing companies and Mid‐Caps into optimum Lean‐Agile factories with manufacturing and delivery of new and/or personalized products and services as their business strategy.
