Foreign universities in Incheon to strengthen cooperation with local industries

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Foreign universities in Incheon to strengthen cooperation with local industries

A view of the Incheon Global Campus in Songdo, Incheon. [INCHEON FREE ECONOMIC ZONE]

A view of the Incheon Global Campus in Songdo, Incheon. [INCHEON FREE ECONOMIC ZONE]

 
Foreign universities at the Incheon Global Campus in Songdo will be strengthening cooperation with local industries, the Incheon Free Economic Zone (IFEZ) announced Monday.  
 
A revision to the Act on the Promotion of Industrial-Academic Education and Industry-Academic Cooperation was implemented at the end of September, which has enabled institutional cooperation between foreign universities and industry sectors.  
 
The Industry-Academic Cooperation Act describes “industry-academia-research cooperation” as activities conducted by industrial educational institutions, the central and local governments, research institutes and industrial enterprises, through mutual cooperation. It covers training human resources, research and commercialization of new knowledge and technologies, transfer of technologies and sharing of resources held by research institutes.  
 
This allows for foreign universities to launch programs partnering with industries catering to their specialties. Schools have been working on establishing industry-academia cooperation groups to pursue such projects.  
 
SUNY Korea was the first American university to launch at the Incheon Global Campus in March 2012 and established its new industry-academia cooperation group in late September.
 
Professors and researchers in departments specializing in fields that are crucial to the fourth industrial revolution will cooperate with the city of Incheon for local and global research, such as those in the computer science and applied mathematics departments specializing in artificial intelligence and big data, and mechanical engineering departments specializing in robotics.  
 
The school’s business administration department will expand its start-up center to allow collaboration while its technological systems management department will work to raise convergence in education to global standards with a pilot program specializing in STEAM (science, technology, engineering, art and mathematics).
 
The fashion design and fashion management departments at the Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT) will likewise pair with Incheon’s fashion industry, focusing on marketing, product development and globalization programs for next year.
 
“Through the establishment of the industry-academia cooperation group, we are able to expand on joint research and cooperation with local companies, and our university plans to use all of our resources to contribute in many ways to the development of cutting-edge technology by Incheon companies and to enable their entering of global markets," said Han Min-koo, vice president of SUNY Korea and the head of the school’s industry-academia cooperation group.
 
George Mason University Korea will also launch an industry-academia cooperation group at the end of the month to cooperate with local industries and its researchers at its U.S. campus in Virginia, playing a local-global bridging role. It can provide a networking platform for professors and industries and enable projects in areas such as business management, economics, international studies and computer game design. The Korea campus is expected to expand cooperation with researchers at the U.S. campus’ Center for Policy Study and its Peace And Conflict Studies Center Asia.
 
Ghent University Global Campus likewise signed a memorandum of understanding with Charles River Laboratories Korea in August to share biotech knowledge and skills starting in spring 2021. Such efforts are expected to enhance the biotech cluster in Songdo and also help advance Korean biotech companies.
 
The University of Utah Asia campus is working to expand its Center for Medical Innovation (CMI) working with the IFEZ. CMI Asia, with the support of the local government, will focus on supporting start-ups and early-stage biotechnology companies with educational programs on best practices for success in the medical device industry, according to the school.
 
BY SARAH KIM   [kim.sarah@joongang.co.kr]
 
Lee Won-jae, commissioner of the Incheon Free Economic Zone Authority, fourth from left, poses with leadership of the University of Utah Asia campus on Nov. 4 after a meeting on industry-academia cooperation. [INCHEON FREE ECONOMIC ZONE]

Lee Won-jae, commissioner of the Incheon Free Economic Zone Authority, fourth from left, poses with leadership of the University of Utah Asia campus on Nov. 4 after a meeting on industry-academia cooperation. [INCHEON FREE ECONOMIC ZONE]

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