SMARTA Sustainability Network event brings businesses and universities together
Marine South East recently hosted delegates and speakers from more than 21 organisations at a SMARTA Sustainability Network event held at Port Solent. SMARTA is a project funded by the European Development Fund.
The theme was an exploration of the ways in which businesses could enhance their research and development activities through working with universities and research organisations.
The first speaker, James Grazebrook of Halyard (M&I) gave a fascinating insight into two pieces of work completed with the University of Southampton. The first involved working on a Euro750,000 EU-funded project (Soundboat) to investigate methods of verifying acoustic limits set by the European Commission under the Recreational Craft Directive (RCD) in 2000. The second involved the development of a Helmholtz resonator silencer. The collaboration helped Halyard progress from a 25 employee company with £2.5m turnover in 2000 to an 80 employee company turning over £6.5m in 2008.
Ned Minns of IT Power talked about the tremendous benefits they've seen from working with graduates from Bristol and Southampton Universities. Three graduates on Eng.D programmes joined the IT Power team to work on various projects. Thea Morgan (Bristol) explored improvements in Systems Engineering, Jack Giles (Southampton) undertook an investigation into a flow acceleration system and Mark Leybourne (Southampton) undertook an investigation into the validation and scaling of the OWEL wave power system.
The final speaker, Susan Phillips of EchoPilot spoke about the history of the company and how they had worked to great advantage with QinetiQ and Bournemouth University to develop forward looking sonars.
Following the presentations, a panel comprising representatives of Southampton, Portsmouth and Southampton Solent universities answered questions on the services and facilities available from the universities and how these could best be accessed by marine businesses.
The delegates' response to the event was whole heartedly supportive, with many stating how useful and informative it had been.
If you would like to join the SMARTA Sustainability Network, please email Steve Sharp stephen@marinesoutheast.co.uk
SMARTA is a project part funded by the European Union through the European Regional Development Fund.
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