ClusterFY was a lively agent in two important dates for Castilla-La Mancha during the month of November: the VI Telecommunications Night of Castilla-La Mancha, held in Ciudad Real on the 17th of November 2017 and; the III B2B Industrial Meeting of Castilla-La Mancha, which took place in Tomelloso on the 23rd of November 2017.
Both activities, which are regarded as the two major business networking events in the region, were successfully developed with a great participation of the key players from ICT (i.e. Telefónica, Indra, Vodafone, Orange, IBM) and manufacturing sectors in the region respectively.
The Telecommunications Night of Castilla-La Mancha is the most important social and technical annual event in Castilla-La Mancha which aims to bring together all the relevant players in the Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) sector. The meeting has been co-organized by the Regional Government, the Professional Association of Telecommunication Engineers, the “Fundación Caja Rural de Castilla-La Mancha” and the ClusterFY Interreg project.
The topic of this year’s technical session was promoted by ClusterFY team and underscored the challenges and ongoing works related with the application of Advanced Manufacturing Technologies to “Industry 4.0”, which is one of the Key Enabling Technologies pinpointed by the European Commission.
A panel of experts, representing the most important ICT companies in Spain, presented their different approaches and views regarding this subject, of great importance for Castilla-La Mancha. The debate was moderated by the General Director of Telecommunications and New Technologies, Alipio García Rodríguez and Juan Carlos Lopez informed the attendees about the goals and activities of ClusterFY.
On the other hand, the III B2B Industrial Meeting of Castilla-La Mancha - organized by ITECAM, the metal mechanic cluster of Castilla-La Mancha and one of the main stakeholders of the ClusterFY project, with the support of the Foreign Promotion Institute of Castilla-La Mancha, and sponsored by AENOR - counted with the participation of 175 companies and 9 research groups from the regional University. A total of 310 professionals held more than 500 one-to-one meetings with the goal to strengthen commercial and joint collaborations. This year, as a novelty, a delegation of important companies from countries such as México, Perú, Chile, and Uruguay visited this networking activity.
As part of the planned agenda, ClusterFY organized a session about clusters of innovation and the digital transformation of industrial SMEs. Juan Carlos López, the ClusterFY project leader in Castilla-La Mancha, introduced the ClusterFY project to the audience and chaired a dialogue with the attendees about the applicability of the cluster concept in the region and the importance of KETs in the modern industry.
