2015. 01. 14..
Organised by the National Innovation Office with the cooperation of numerous Hungarian organisations and professional backing from Design Terminal and HIPAVILON Hungarian Intellectual Property Agency, the country’s major international research-development-innovation conference and startup exhibition was held in Budapest’s Akvárium Klub on 16-17 October 2014.
The event was attended by the most prominent figures, professional decision-makers of the Hungarian and international RDI scene, including Clara de la Torre, the director for Key Enabling Technologies at the European Commission, Pierre Roy, the Deputy Director of the French National Centre for Scientific Research, and Juha Ruohonen, a founding member of the international startup accelerator Startup Sauna. The event was hosted by chief patron Dr. József Pálinkás, the government commissioner for the Development and Innovation Office, and patron Dr. László Palkovics, the minister of state for higher education.
The nearly 100 presentations – organised into 16 sections of the two-day conference – were focussing on the major trends and processes governing various fields of RDI, introducing attendees to such topics as bionics, nanotechnology, brain research, the EU’s Horizont 2020 programme, or climate politics. Furthermore, subjects covered the financial field, regional development and cooperation, and the role of governments in innovation.
With assistance from the Budapest French Institute, Colas’ Technology Directorate set up a stand presenting the company’s leading innovations regarding road construction, including low temperature asphalts, noise-reducing pavements, and recycled asphalt mixes.
The conference was made complete by 35 startup exhibitors, with participants of the Hungarian creative sector, startupper women, top enterprises of various domestic regions, and Hungarian expatriates’ touristic startups among their ranks. Through the BE VISIBLE competition, additional exhibition areas were available to startups having actual, presentable prototypes. A professional jury evaluated the applications, and the top competitors were granted a place at the exhibition.
Both the conference and the exhibition were open to guests free of charge.
