Signing of CRI agreements in Trondheim. From left to right: Karl Almaas, President, SINTEF Fisheries and Aquaculture (signing on behalf of the SINTEF Group), Ragnhild Solheim from the Research Council of Norway and Bjørn Hafskjold, Dean, Faculty of Engineering Science and Technology, NTNU. Photo: Gorm Kallestad, Scanpix/NTNU Info

NTNU and SINTEF have been selected as host institutions for six of the 14 centres.

“This shows how innovative and dynamic this region is,” says Rikke Lind (Labour), State Secretary in the Ministry of Industry and Commerce, as she handed over commemorative plaques to the host institutions at a ceremony in Trondheim.

Half a billion kroner
The six centres that will be led from Trondheim will receive a total of about NOK 300 million from the Research Council of Norway in the course of the next five years. Industry and the research institutions themselves will put in at least as much.

The CRI system involves, in other words, a five-year investment in research of well over half a billion kroner – and that is just to the centres that will be led from Trondheim.

Innovation through long-term research
The establishment of the new centres is a new effort by the government that is specially aimed at the most research-intensive sectors of Norwegian industry – in close collaboration with leading-edge university and research groups in Norway.

Competition was tough when the Research Council selected the centres in autumn 2006, with applications coming in from 58 research groups. The centres are intended to encourage innovation through long-term research.

From concrete to medicine
The six centres that will be led from Trondheim will cover a wide range of industries – from oil and gas production systems to concrete technology, light-metal structures, aquaculture technology, next-generation goods manufacturing and medical image-processing.

After four years, all the centres will be evaluated by the Research Council of Norway. The results of the evaluation process will determine whether each centre’s five-year grant should be extended for a further three years.

By Svein Tønseth

The centres led by SINTEF are:

COIN – Concrete Innovation Centre

CREATE - Centre for Research-based Innovation in Aquaculture Technology

NORMAN – Norwegian Manufacturing Future