Tec Labs had the pleasure of participating in the Business & Innovation Network (BIN@) annual event: BIN@PORTO 2024 ‘Innovation for Resilience‘ at Faculty of Engineering – University of Porto and UPTEC (Science and Technology Park of U.PORTO).
During the event, topics such as Energy Transition, Health Challenges, Cybersecurity, Responsible IA, Climate Changes, Nature Base Solutions, IA e Machine Learning, Green Mobility, Food Security and Smart Industry were debated in an innovative and open way. The main goal of workshops was to promote discussion, to identify synergies and opportunities that can support collaboration, and to translate research into value.
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In one of the morning sessions Farid Singh, specialist in Corporate Innovation and Service Design, said almost 90% of cyber-attacks are caused by human error or behavior and 96% of most common passwords can be cracked by hacking tools in less than a second. To prevent this situation the creation of efficient strategies to raise awareness among SME workers is required. According to him, in the last decade there has been exponential growth in the financing of artificial intelligence and start-ups should take advantage of this to create business models that use this technology, which are in accordance with SME Cybersecurity needs, considering Budget, Awareness, Speed reaction, Confidence and Benchmark.
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Jodi Forlizzi, from Carnegie Mellon University, highlighted that new methods and processes are needed to successfully and responsibly innovate with AI. Taking this assumption into account, the research carried out discovered new methods to develop successful AI products that are technically achievable, financially viable, desirable by customers, free of unintended harms moving away from designers and user-centered design processes.
Violeta Bulc, of Ecocivilisation movement founder, emphasized that in order to solve the Water Stress problem we need to move from a human-centric to a planetary-centric mindset seeing planet Earth as an ecological haven within our galaxy, getting rid of the boxes and the tunnel visions.
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At the end of the first day, we visited the Leça do Balio Monastery, a national monument from the Roman era that played an important role in the history of Portugal, restored by the architects Siza Vieira and Sidónio Pardal, today it has become an important cultural center promoted by the Livraria Lello Foundation. The exhibition on display on Disinformation aims to “raise awareness of the growing threat that fake news poses to contemporary democracies.”
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At Lionesa Business Hub, a business center dedicated to industry 5.0, where over 7,000 people work, from 47 different nationalities, which invests in the talent and happiness of workers, the debate “Innovation through Culture, Community and Human Sustainability” took place, which highlighted the people´s role to mobilize for change within organizations.
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In the second day we discuss “Climate Resilient Cities: Nature-based Solutions (NBS)” in one of the Action Tanks panels. Nowadays the cities to survive must be resilient to face climate changes. NBS can provide an efficient tool to reach this goal. According, Pedro Soutinho, from CEDES, NBS approach can bring some advantages such as being perceived as “complementing technology, low cost and low energy intensity, high potential impact and having triple-win benefits (environment, society, economy).” For other hand some challenges must be in consideration: the “concept must be clarified”, there is “lack of integration of policies”, its necessary to “build a repository of tested solutions”, “proper impact assessment”, and use KPI´s.
One of the speakers on the debate about AI & Machine Learning, João Ramos Pimenta, of Promeneum, stressed that Portuguese industry must invest in robotics and AI to overcome the lack of workers and compete with Eastern European countries.
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Extended Reality (which combines Virtual Reality (VR), Augmented Reality (AR), and Mixed Reality) can help Industries face growing challenges in efficiency, safety and training by creating new ways of interaction. This vision was defended by Leonardo Dicker, of XR.Lab, on Smart Industry session. Accordingly, PwC, VR learners were four time faster to train than in the classroom, 275% more confident to apply skills learned after training, four time more emotionally connected to content than classroom learners and more focused than their e-learning peers.
On the third day of the event we move to UPTEC (Science and Technology Park of U.PORTO) that had on exhibition a wide group of technology showcases and some technology demonstrations/simulations.
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One of the top sessions for the entrepreneurs should be the “Reverse Pitch – Tech and BlueTech” in which many investors spoke about the most important things that Startups Pitches must have in order to receive investment, such as having a good team, focus and making a great fit with the Investor’s portfolio.
Martina Guzmán delighted the audience with a hands-on job talk “How to Make an Impact when Pitching to Investors”. Combining the key elements of “The Best3minutes Methodology” with investor-specific pitching techniques, this keynote helped startups to boost their pitch.
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21 entrepreneurs based at UPTEC (Science and Technology Park of U.PORTO), from different scientific areas, presented their business ideas. Applying the techniques learned with Martina Guzmán, the entrepreneurs had 5 minutes to creatively spark the interest of potential partners and investors.
To end this inspiring day, we enjoyed a Farewell Party with live music, drinks and roasted chestnuts.
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The Next Business & Innovation Network stop will be Brussels in February 2025. 🛫
A special thanks to Faculty of Engineering – University of Porto and UPTEC (Science and Technology Park of U.PORTO) for these amazing 3 days of sharing insights, co-creation and open-innovation.
