Exruptive to participate in new ambitious X-ray industry portal as founding SME partner. Innovation Fund Denmark supports the project with DKK 50 million.
February 22, 2016
"Historical opportunity seized: Value creation in Danish industry through the world’s most powerful neutron and X-ray microscope."
- Innovation Fund Denmark
Three universities partner up to help Danish companies in utilizing brand new approaches for product development. 15 companies are already involved in the collaboration.
Two large research facilities with a powerful Danish imprint is currently being built in Lund: ESS and MAX IV, which will function as the world’s most powerful neutron and X-ray microscope respectively. Both provide a historical opportunity to strengthen the Danish research environments and companies’ innovation and competitiveness within everything from technologies in production and sustainable energy to food products and new pharmaceuticals.
This is the first step in realizing the strategy that was revealed in November 2015, about Denmark being able to benefit from the two facilities being placed near Copenhagen. The ESS strategy points out that you, like CERN, will be able to attract talents and companies from all over the world and spread out the benefits into the Danish industry and society.
- "The massive investments in Lund may give the Danish materials research a crucial leap forward. LINX simultaneously provides an opportunity for the methods of the research and the results to be extended into Danish industry on an early stage. Grundfos is looking forward to becoming one of the spearheads and, in the long run, expect to be able to utilize the newest and most advanced methods within materials research to improve our products", Senior Science Advisor Poul Toft Frederiksen from Grundfos explains.
Innovation Fund Denmark has recently invested in the community partnership LINX aiming to give Danish Industry the maximum yield from the new techniques. Researchers from University of Aarhus, University of Copenhagen and Technical University of Denmark have partnered up on a common portal that will build bridges between companies and the large facilities. The projects in LINX are defined by the industry, typically based on challenges regarding materials, components and biotechnological products. For example in relation to efficiency, durability or quality assurance. The new techniques provide a unique understanding that gives the companies a leap ahead in the international competition.
15 companies have been committed to the project from start by providing funds and workforce. The goal is to continuously add new partners and projects to LINX. Furthermore, a secretariat will be placed in the building of Danish Industry (DI), where interested companies can approach the project. Here the needs of the companies will be mapped and opportunities for testing at the university facilities will be provided.
Almost every dramatic societal change from transport, communication and the invention of computers and internet, began with the exploration of the physics and chemistry of materials. The aim with LINX is to understand the structure of the materials and biotechnological products that the involved companies are working with – all the way down to atomic level, in three dimensions and often under working conditions.
And so, the expectations for the results of the research in materials and biotechnology are great. Therefore, it is also important that researchers and companies start utilizing each other’s resources to a higher degree.
LINX will focus on building new cross collaborations – partly between industry and university and partly between companies with common challenges towards materials.
- "We are looking forward to LINX being able to help Danish companies in finding crucial answers on some of their material challenges. It is very positive that research groups from the three major universities have gone together about this and that Innovation Fund Denmark supports the promising project", Charlotte Rønhof, Deputy Director in DI, says.
Investment from Innovation Fund Denmark: DKK 50 million
Combined budget of the project: DKK 77.9 million
Project duration: 5 years
Official project title: LINX – Linking Industry to Neutrons and X-rays