At their annual meeting, the EuroTech presidents looked back on the diverse achievements and success stories of the past year. Two of the greatest achievements were even present: the presidents of the newly integrated partner universities, École Polytechnique Paris (l’X) and the Technion, Israel. For the first time among six partners, the presidents discussed the strategy and vision of the alliance.
A major topic were the 2015 established focus areas. They serve as a building block for the alliance in regards to EU-funding uptake, positioning and visibility in Brussels and beyond, and encourage bottom-up engagement of researchers for joint activities. With the new alliance partners and their distinctive profile and strengths, as well as recent developments of the founding members, all presidents agree that it is time to define new research domains, where EuroTech can be first movers and have a true impact as technical universities in Europe.
While the established EuroTech Focus Areas will still receive support and have many ongoing activities, researchers can soon expect new Alliance collaboration tools, extended seed funding and exciting opportunities to engage with colleagues across the six partners on the EuroTech website.
The next year will give TUM the opportunity to have a great impact on the developments of the Alliance, as President Wolfgang A. Herrmann has taken over the chair position among the presidents until June 2020. TUM President-elect Thomas Hofmann also joined the meeting in Lausanne to meet his future colleagues, share his ideas and be best prepared for his term starting in October.