IRSEEM, ESIGELEC’s Research Institute, welcomed Open Innovation partners for a partnership meeting from October 21st to 23rd 2013.

Figures involved in the project came from Belgium, Germany, Ireland, Britain and France to visit Seine Innopolis, CREA’s new business incubator (Rouen council) in Petit-Quevilly and CISE (Embedded Systems Integration Campus), the new ESIGELEC-IRSEEM building devoted to innovation and technology transfer.

Funded by the European Interreg IV B programme and the Haute-Normandie Regional Council, the Open Innovation project aims to develop and promote ideas, methods and tools in open innovation. One by one, the partners organised meetings to present current and upcoming projects. Everyone then implemented innovative activities with the help and experience of others.

Many of these activities are already underway or in the planning stages at IRSEEM. The Open Innovation project also co-funded a "Start-up Weekend" from November 15th to 17th 2013 and a "Hackathon" on November 30th and December 1st. The Start-up Weekend is a 3 day contest in which groups of students have to create an innovative start-up whilst Hackathon is a programming competition whose 2013 theme was photography.

Last but not least, three former ESIGELEC students from the G.E.E.M. (Embedded Electronics Technology Cluster of which IRSEEM is a member) plan to create a start-up on the subject of welfare. One of them, Mathieu Barbier, promoted the project at the Converge Challenge on November 19th and 20th in Edinburgh as part of the Open Innovation project.

Other activities in the pipeline up to the end of the project in May 2014: the Neoshop will soon be set up in the Seine Innopolis premises. The pop-up shop displaying innovative products from companies in the region. Another Start-up Weekend may also be organised on a site to be confirmed.

Contact : Vincent Lepers, European Project Manager, vincent.lepers@esigelec.fr