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Visinnovasjon.no > Aktuelt > New catapult centre for ocean innovation in Bergen
The team on stage to receive the grant.
The grant was announced by The Minister of Trade and Industry Torbjørn Røe Isaksen. Parts of the team received the grant and congratulations on stage. From left: The Minister of Trade and Industry Torbjørn Røe Isaksen (H), Bodil Valland Steinhaug (GC Rieber), Hilde Indresøvde (Bergen Teknologioverføring – BTO), Anders Helland (Prototech), Inge Ådland (Bergen Teknologioverføring – BTO), Owe Hagesæther (GCE Subsea) and Stein Terje Dahl (Siva).

New catapult centre for ocean innovation in Bergen

The Ocean Innovation Norwegian Catapult Centre (OINC) was announced as a new catapult centre at today’s Siva conference. OINC will be a national centre with focus on development of new solutions for growth and green readjustment within the ocean industries.
05.06.2018

The Minister of Trade and Industry Torbjørn Røe Isaksen announced three new catapult centres at the Siva conference in Trondheim Tuesday 5th of June. One of them was the Ocean Innovation Norwegian Catapult Centre (OINC), which Bergen Teknologioverføring (BTO) will establish in close cooperation with several major actors and industry clusters.

40 million to first phase

OINC will be a test, simulation and visualisation centre where excellent expertise, infrastructure and network will be available for the ocean industries. The catapult centre will receive about 40 million NOK in support to first phase through the Norwegian Catapult programme. The total budget of the centre is about 84 million NOK.

– The objective is faster sustainable blue growth through efficient prototyping and verification of new solutions for the ocean industries. OINC will contribute to the competence building both internal in the companies attending in the centre, and through the education program from the research and development partners in the project, says Inge Ådland, Senior Business Developer in BTO.

National ambitions

OINC will help companies to move faster from the idea stage to the market. The target group is especially small and medium-sized businesses across the country, but also larger companies and research and development environments.

– It is important for us to work nationally. Our main competition are international, and it is important that we work together. We want to include the whole country in our catapult centre – including competing initiatives, says Owe Hagesæther, Chief Executive Officer at GCE Subsea, one of the partners in the project.

Strong Consortium

OIC is a consortium consisting of Bergen Teknologioverføring (BTO), GCE Subsea, NCE Seafood Innovation Cluster, Prototech, Stiftelsen Industrilaboratoriet (ILAB), University of Bergen, DNV GL and Marineholmen Forskningspark. OIC has establish collaboration with a wide range of national and international leading companies, research institutes and test centres.

The main location of the centre will be in Bergen, with collaboration and availability for the global ocean innovation community.

About Norwegian Catapult

Norwegian Catapult is a governmental owned competence infrastructure programme that aims to build test, simulation and visualization centres for industrial based research and innovation projects. The program aims to move new ideas faster, cheaper and better from the concept stage to introduction to the market. The programme is organised by Siva in cooperation with the Research Council of Norway and Innovation Norway.

The budget of the programme in 2018 are 125 million NOK. In addition to OIC, NCE Maritime CleanTech with their Sustainable Maritime Norwegian Catapult Centre and ÅKP Blue Innovation Arena with their DigiCat Norwegian Catapult Centre have been granted a Norwegian Catapult centre.

Read more about the Norwegian Catapult programme here.


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