Provided by Hyotan Group, Hitachi City
Center for Cooperative Research and Development (CCRD), Ibaraki University February,  2009
1. Outline       The importance of support for technical and industrial development by the cooperation between industry and the academic world has been pointed out for a long time. Especially in provincial area, the importance is paid attention for developing local industry. Here we would like to introduce the organization and the activities of CCRD. Ibaraki University which consists of the College of Engineering in Hitachi city, the College of Science and Education in Mito and the College of Agriculture in Ami town and has produced 20 year excellent results. At present, Ibaraki University is very active as the leading member in �gHitachi Monozukuri Kyogikai (HMK, creating product council) which is organized with local association in the projects �gto reinvigorate local economies�h and �gto develop local brands�h.       Besides, they cope with each issue working together. Regarding the theme of joint research, we withhold to introduce here since it is treated based on the contract among the persons concerned.
2. Organization and Activity Target 2.1 Activities of HMK     The cooperation between industry and the academic world in Hitachi city is promoted to have HMK (established in May, 2003) play a central role as the nucleus for stepping up Hitachi city�fs object of creating products. The head of CCRD represents also as the chairman of HMK. The activities are Ibaraki University�fs research tour, enterprises�f tour, promoting the activities of HMS (Hitachi Monozukuri Salon), field trip to advanced areas of cooperation between industry and the academic world, and forwarding enterprises to encourage people�fs talents. HMK is organized by the local industry placing Hitachi Chamber of Commerce and Industry as a leader, Ibaraki University, local self-government and Hitachi Industry Supporting Center. At Ibaraki University, CCRD plays a leadership and supports development of industrial technology, civil and building technique and processing vegetable and fish in the College of Engineering and Agriculture.
Nakamura Jiko Co. Ltd.	Toho Co. Ltd.
2.2 CCRD�fs Activities   Actual examples of CCRD�fs activities are as follows:      ‡@ Technology consultation and promotion of various fairs for aiming conformity of needs between enterprises           and universities     ‡A Promotion of planning for joint research with enterprises     ‡B Field trip to enterprises to inform the seeds of new technologies for research     ‡C Support for obtaining a research fund from the outside     ‡D Cooperation with organizations inside and outside of university     ‡E Control and management of intellectual property and technology transfer     As one of projects for cooperation between industry and the academic world, coordinators are dispatched by the Ministry of Education Science and Culture. They promote local consortium type research to revitalize an area and take an action aiming regional innovation. Further, there are four university union (4u) in the Metropolitan area. They are Ibaraki Univ., Utsunomiya Univ., Gunma Univ. and Saitama Univ. Ibaraki University works as the head of the department of �gCreating local brands�h.
Introduction of local industrial companies at Kogakusai Festival, Ibaraki Univercity
3. Actual Activity Result     Ibaraki University gets interchange among the university, industry and administration through the activities of HMK. Therefore they can pick up the theme suggested there for a joint research, which brings successful results of cooperation between industry and the academic world. This also helps faculty staffs and students show interests in local industries and it turns out increase of technical consultation for local industries and joint researches.     Examples of CCRD successful result of activity in 2007 were as follows: Signed Joint researches were 175, 85 out of 175 were the enterprises in Ibaraki prefecture and 47 out of 85 were small and medium-sized enterprises.     Ibaraki University�fs ranking was 27 among 730 nationwide public universities per statistics of Ministry of Education, Science and Culture. They also occupied the position the 11th for contribution to local area per statistics of Nippon Economical Newspaper.
4 Reporters Remarks     We got an impression that the activities of CCRD with the leadership of Ibaraki University were surely improving the results through over 20 year successful results. It is worth praising that they have made successful results in the new encounter between university and small and medium-sized enterprises where it was believed difficult to find any connection before. However there is such issue that it is difficult to gain actual effect in a total plan and to think of the whole image of results beforehand. If the effect to local economy can be confirmed by index, it will be favorable for promoting future projects. In the management of this kind of joint projects, there might be many warps, that is, vertical connections from administration side. We wish the organization like universities which are on neutral ground will play an important role as the wefts to be connected with warps.
5. Contact to:     Address: Center for Cooperative Research and Development (CCRD), Ibaraki University     4-12-1 Nakanarusawa, Hitachi, Ibaraki 316-8511, Japan     Tel: 0294-38-5005 Fax: 0294-38-5240     Homepage: http://www.rd.ibaraki.ac.jp/

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