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“Cafè amb la Recerca” (Research over a coffee), organised by the “Fundació Catalana per a la Recerca i la Innovació”, seeks to offer a meeting point in which research centres, companies, and investors can explore collaboration initiatives.

In the first session of this series, Joan J. Guinovart, director of the IRB Barcelona and Josep Samitier, director of the IBEC presented their research lines to eight managerial representatives from the business and investment sectors.

The “Fundació Catalana per a la Recerca i la Innovació” (FCRi) has launched a new networking initiative directed at Catalan research centres, companies, and investors called “Cafè amb la recerca” (Research over a coffee), which forms part of this organisation’s Science – Business Programme.

Envisaged as an informal setting in which to promote dialogue between research organisations and the business sector, the first event in the series hold yesterday convened the IRB Barcelona and the IBEC with the companies AXA, Reig-Jofre, Nature Bisse, Semillas Fitó, Damm, Lipotec, Lucta and AB Médica Grup.

Joan J. Guinovart, director of IRB Barcelona and Josep Samitier, director of IBEC, have presented the current lines of research of the respective centres to managerial representatives from eight companies.

The objective of the sessions is to identify possible points of mutual interest between lines of research and the objectives of the companies attending the event with the aim to establish collaborative alliances.

The session was opened by Enric Claverol, director general of the FCRi. This foundation organises these meetings as part of its strategic goal to foster networking between science and the business sector.

The “Cafè amb la Recerca” sessions last two hours, the first devoted to the presentation of the two invited centres and the second to discussion on interests shared with the companies involved.

The Science – Business Programme of the FCRi seeks to align the challenges faced by the business sector regarding innovation with the scientists, technologists and entrepreneurs most able to tackle them. The programme also aims to raise private funding for university research projects or centres that can serve the specific production needs of the industrial sector in Catalonia.

About IRB Barcelona

The Institute for Research in Biomedicine (IRB Barcelona) pursues a society free of disease. To this end, it conducts multidisciplinary research of excellence to cure cancer and other diseases linked to ageing. It establishes technology transfer agreements with the pharmaceutical industry and major hospitals to bring research results closer to society, and organises a range of science outreach activities to engage the public in an open dialogue. IRB Barcelona is an international centre that hosts 400 researchers and more than 30 nationalities. Recognised as a Severo Ochoa Centre of Excellence since 2011, IRB Barcelona is a CERCA centre and member of the Barcelona Institute of Science and Technology (BIST).