The Industry-Academia Collaborative Innovation Human Resource Development Consortium Project, proposed by a group that includes Kyoto University as a key member, was adopted in FY2013 under METI's Medium-long Term Research Talent Exchange System Construction Program. A symposium commemorating the launch of the project was held at the Hotel Grand Arc Hanzomon.
For Japan to propel innovative science and technology, create new types of industries based on them, and launch them as businesses onto the global market, it is essential to continually foster innovative talents that will immediately affect our industrial competitiveness. The primary purpose of this project, therefore, is to foster through collaboration human resources able to create innovations that give us the industrial competitiveness to lead the global market. Serving as the base for this purpose are the members of the project that include universities (Kyoto University, Hokkaido University, Tohoku University, University of Tsukuba, Chiba University, University of Tokyo, Waseda University, Keio University, Tokyo Institute of Technology, Osaka University, Kobe University and Kyushu University), among which Kyoto University plays a central role, and industries (Mitsubishi Electric Corp.; Daikin Industries, Ltd.; Toray Industries, Inc.; Panasonic Corp.; Hitz Research Alliance Laboratory [Hitz Biomass Lab and Hitachi Zosen Corp.]; Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Ltd.; Murata Manufacturing Co., Ltd.; and DMG Mori Seiki Co., Ltd.).
As new opportunities to master cutting-edge practical skills at the world's leading companies, the project will offer a medium-long-term, research-oriented, talent-development internship to students of these leading universities who possess outstanding basic scholastic abilities and specialized knowledge. Unlike most conventional internship programs, which are conducted between a university and a company on a one-to-one basis, the project creates an industry-academia collaboration platform involving multiple companies and universities in each collaboration in order to establish high-quality educational programs with a greater distribution of information.
On January 20, 2014, the Industry-Academia Collaborative Innovation Human Development Association was founded as an operation base for this consortium project (representative director: Executive Vice-President Toshiyuki Awaji from Kyoto University).
At the symposium, following opening remarks by President Hiroshi Matsumoto and Mr. Kazuhiko Tsutsumi (executive officer at Mitsubishi Electric Corporation) as well as congratulatory speeches by Director-General Hirofumi Katase (Industrial Science and Technology Policy and Environment Bureau, METI) and Director-General Daisuke Yoshida (Higher Education Bureau, MEXT), Mr. Yukichi Deguchi (senior vice president, and general manager of the Research & Development Division at Toray Industries, Inc.) gave a keynote presentation titled "Human Resources to Drive the Creation of New Values. " Then Executive Vice-President Awaji summarized the project, and President Kaoru Kamata (Waseda University), President Yoshinao Mishima (Tokyo Institute of Technology), President Yasushi Saito (Chiba University), and Mr. Hisakazu Mizutani (member of the board of directors and executive vice president of Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Ltd.) expressed their expectations for the new industry-academia collaboration platform. In addition, Kiyoshi Higashijima (a trustee) from Osaka University and Mr. Toru Inazuka from Daikin Industries, Ltd. gave speeches on behalf of the association. At the reception that followed, honorable guests from ministries and agencies as well as representatives of member universities and corporations gave speeches. The event ended on a successful note with a closing remark by Executive Vice President Hiroyuki Yamato (University of Tokyo).
 Group photo of representatives from ministries and agencies involved with the consortium project and member universities and member corporations |
