[Asia Economy Yeongnam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Kim Jonghyo] Busan City and Busan Institute of Science and Technology Promotion (BISTEP) announced on the 30th that they are recruiting local public institutions and companies to participate in the '2020 External Cooperation Planning Support Project' by the 10th of next month to strengthen regional competitiveness through industrial structure innovation and to proactively respond to future technologies of the 4th Industrial Revolution.
This project aims to support the necessary project expenses for planning research and development (R&D) projects that lead industrial innovation by utilizing excellent human and physical infrastructure in the Busan region, and to attract government R&D projects based on the resulting planning reports.
The tasks to be planned include all industries capable of industrial structure innovation and new industry creation, including Busan City's seven strategic industries (mart marine, intelligent machinery, future transportation equipment, global tourism, intelligent information services, life care, cleantech). The final planned tasks will be selected by a professional evaluation committee next month.
The project is operated in two forms based on innovation entities: 'Public Institution Cooperation Planning Support Project' and 'Field Demand-Based Planning Support Project.'
The Public Institution Cooperation Planning Support Project requires joint execution by two or more innovation institutions such as government-funded research institutes located in the region, specialized production technology research institutes, and city-funded institutions. For example, an IT institution and a transportation/facility operation institution can collaborate to propose a disaster and safety technology development project, or public institutions related to logistics, ports, marine, and machinery can cooperate to plan projects providing advanced logistics services. A total of 6 tasks will be supported with 150 million KRW.
The 'Field Demand-Based Planning Support Project' aims to promote R&D and strengthen capabilities of local small and medium enterprises (SMEs), with companies as the lead institutions, and is divided into industry-academia-research cooperation type and consulting cooperation type. The industry-academia-research cooperation type plans tasks where industry, academia, and research collaborate to meet the technical demands of companies, while the consulting cooperation type plans tasks through matching companies with consulting firms registered as R&D service providers. A total of 8 tasks will be supported with 120 million KRW in this project.
BISTEP will establish and operate a 'Regional Innovation Project Continuous Proposal System' starting this year. It continuously receives technology demands and business ideas from local researchers and industry stakeholders, evaluates them, and selects excellent proposals to be utilized in planning large national projects and policy formulation. It also plans to support expert matching, detailed planning support, and national fund attraction consulting by listening to proposers' opinions. The continuous proposal method involves downloading the form from the Busan Science and Technology Information Service and submitting it through the system.
A Busan City official stated, "The government R&D budget surpassed 20 trillion KRW for the first time in 2019 and is expected to continue increasing to 24.2 trillion KRW this year," adding, "We hope for active participation from regional innovation institutions to attract R&D projects that will lead regional industrial innovation."
Meanwhile, BISTEP canceled the originally planned 'External Cooperation Planning Support Project Briefing' due to the COVID-19 situation and posted explanatory materials on its website, while planning to provide detailed explanations about the project via phone and email. For more details, refer to the announcement on the Busan Institute of Science and Technology Promotion website or contact by phone.
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