B-SMARTT!
The border region (BE-NL) boasts a thriving high-tech manufacturing industry but faces significant challenges in terms of technological transitions and sustainability. The strong emergence of the green and circular biotechnology and advanced materials sectors (together referred to as the biotech/advanced materials sector) offers opportunities to make the high-tech manufacturing industry more sustainable. However, this young sector is itself confronted with major challenges such as high risk of failure, substantial investment costs, and a lack of specialised knowledge, which makes upscaling far from straightforward.
B-SMARTT! stands for Biotechnology-driven – Smart, Market-oriented, Additive Manufacturing-based, R&D-supporting Technological Transition!
The project aims to foster cross-sectoral collaboration between these two technology-driven sectors in order to stimulate innovation, economic growth, and social impact.
To achieve this, the project is building a sustainable innovation platform that clusters and strengthens knowledge about materials and technology. Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) will gain access to this platform, where technological expertise and infrastructure are available in the areas of materials, processes, and validation — enabling them to realise feasible circular innovation projects.
In addition, business expertise will be made available through an open business ecosystem that supports entrepreneurs in defining their circular innovation projects. The focus is on two types of innovation projects:
- Material innovation based on residual streams, and
- Market-oriented technological innovation for product development and specific production process solutions — resulting in tangible outcomes.
