With the support of the Széchenyi István University Foundation, the university’s competence centres have a new and additional funding resource to implement their full spectrum of research, development, and innovation projects. At the RD&I launch event, the staff of the institution reviewed the plans of the individual research projects.
The Széchenyi István University Foundation supports the implementation of innovative university projects with a total of 1 billion 911 million HUF, of which 441 million 386 thousand HUF will be granted this year. RD&I activities will cover key areas such as artificial intelligence, mobility technologies, precision farming, and health tech, and their business development. All projects reviewed at the launch event aim to both develop advanced technologies to support sustainability efforts as well as strengthen the region’s competitiveness.
At the event, Prof. Dr. László Palkovics, Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Foundation, explained that the Széchenyi István University is playing an increasingly important role in the field of sustainability and the application of the latest technologies, both in education and in research and development. He stressed.
The institution has a solid financial, infrastructural and scientific background to support and realise these goals, and the Foundation strongly backs the university’s efforts.
He added that the Széchenyi University is on the right track, as demonstrated by its growing popularity, which has led to record enrolments this year, and its ever increasing ranking on significant international university rating publications.
The individual research, development and innovation project ideas brought forward by the institution’s competence centres that characterise significant scientific value and are in line with the university’s strategic objectives, are implemented under the professional supervision of Prof. Dr. József Bokor, Vice President of the University of Széchenyi for Research and Innovation, which was underlined by the Vice President during the launch event.
The university operation model of Széchenyi István University follows the path of other successful institutions such as Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) located in the United States.
He stressed the importance of cooperation between different department faculties and research workshops, and the importance of projects that produce practical, tangible, and commercializable results that can be used in everyday life by solving real world problems. He said that there is regular and continuous consultation with the project leaders to ensure that the research teams can move forward efficiently and quickly to find solutions to any obstacles that lay in their way for the project’s successful completion and publication of its results, not to mention the potential commercial or start-up effect it could bring.
The project support communicated at the launch event included the establishment of the Religion and Science Research Group, the Family Business Centre, the Sustainability Integration Platform, the Spin-off Ecosystem Development Programme, the Artificial Intelligence Research Group, and the Precision Bioengineering Research Group.
Also, several supported projects revolve around health-related research. These include the Health Technology Excellence Programme, the Innovation in Rehabilitation: technical solutions for Pető’s conductive development, the Hungarian GENOM Programme a research & development programme on diagnostic and decision support systems for the personalised targeted therapy of cancer patients. Further supported project themes also include research, scientific, innovation, and educational cooperation with the National Security & Defence Services, and support for student competition teams and technical sports activities.