BALCON

Boosting EU-Western Balkan Countries research collaboration in the Monitoring and Control area (GA No 288076)

Logo of the project "BALCON"

Funding Source

European Commission – DG CONNECT

Programme

FP7 – “Information and Communication Technologies”

Duration

September 2011 – August 2013 (24 months)

Total budget

551.285 €

URL

http://www.balcon-project.eu

Q-PLAN role

Project Coordinator

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Description

BALCON was a Support Action funded by the EC under the FP7 “Information and Communication Technologies” programme (FP7-ICT). It aimed to reinforce the research cooperation between the academic and industrial communities from the EU and the Western Balkan Countries (WBC) that are active in the design, development and implementation of systems and applications for Monitoring and Control (M&C).

The project objectives of BALCON included:

  • analysing the EU-WBC research collaboration potential in the broader field of M&C, by
  • reviewing the R&D priorities and trends in both regions;
  • highlighting the research excellence in the Western Balkan Countries;
  • identifying the research areas of common interest, which may result in substantial benefits for both regions if R&D collaboration is reinforced.
  • creating a community of experts (“Advisory Group”) from both regions in the targeted research field to: catalyse collaboration among leading research teams from both regions; offer a point of reference in the process of reinforcing collaboration among EU and WBC research teams; launch an open dialogue on the research areas with a high EU-WBC collaboration potential.
  • organising a variety of networking, training and awareness raising activities to:
  • share insight into EU-funded collaborative research activities (especially under FP7/HORIZON2020)
  • promote the research competencies of research teams from the Western Balkans
  • bring into direct contact researchers from both region enabling the exchange of ideas on their collaboration potential under FP7/HORIZON2020)
  • prepare the ground for the initiation of joint R&D activities

Q-PLAN responsibilities

  • Project Management / Coordination
  • Formation and operation of the EU-WBC Advisory Group
  • Organisation of the EU-WBC Advisory Group meetings
  • Development of the training material
  • Leading the training activities as tutor
  • Customised support to competent R&D teams from the Western Balkans to enter into research consortia towards FP7-ICT
  • Promotion of WBC research teams into their EU counterparts
  • Development and operation of the project web portal and its tools
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