MIT Portugal News

MPP alumnus is the CEO for Novabase representation in Mozambique

silvia.castro@mitportugal.org (Sílvia Castro) — Thu, 23 May 2013 16:24:17 GMT

Nelson Teodoro, MIT Portugal alumnus, has just been appointed as the new CEO for Novabase representation in Mozambique.

Nelson Teodoro is a MPP graduate of the Sustainable Energy Systems Advanced Studies. He has enroled while he was already at Novabase, a Portuguese company leader in IT with the mission to make life simpler and happier for people and businesses, through technology . In the past 3 years, it has invested more than €26 million in research & development for specialized products and services in the Telecoms & Media, Financial Services, Government & Healthcare, Energy & Utilities, Aerospace & Transportation and Manufacturing & Services sectors.

Now Novabase will operate in Mozambique, a mission that will be led by Nleson Teodoro with an initial staff of 10 employees, employees, a number which Novabase hopes to double by year-end, creating new opportunities for talented young graduates in the areas of management and engineering.

Novabase Mozambique aspires to be a key technology partner for leading banks and mobile operators, and play a major role in the government's structural projects. Another goal is to expand its position to the rest of the African market by exporting knowledge and technology from Mozambique.

Read the article at Oje.

Kristala Prather, MPP faculty member, Granted MIT Tenure

silvia.castro@mitportugal.org (Sílvia Castro) — Wed, 22 May 2013 09:03:58 GMT

Kristala Jones Prather, the Theodore T. Miller Associate Professor of Chemical Engineering at MIT, has been awarded permanent tenure.

Prather is an investigator in the multi-institutional Synthetic Biology Engineering Research Center (SynBERC) funded by the National Science Foundation (USA) and a MIT Portugal Faculty member. Prather is a faculty member of the MPP’s Bioengineering focus area, and under this program, she participates in research projects in collaboration with Portuguese Faculty at Instituto Superior Técnico (Lisboa, Portugal) in the development and test of E. coli strains specifically adapted to meet the upstream and downstream processing challenges associated with large scale production of plasmid vectors. She is also a supervisor of several PhD Bioengineering MPP PhD candidates that have been developing part of their research project at her MIT laboratory.

You can read more about Prather research work at the MIT Department of Chemical Engineering website, including her work as a MPP Faculty member and as a member of the MIT Office of Engineering Outreach Programs' advisory board since November 2009.

GPA Portugal 2013: Applications have already started

silvia.castro@mitportugal.org (Sílvia Castro) — Sat, 18 May 2013 09:48:57 GMT

You can now submit your application to the Green Project Awards Portugal- 6th Edition, which has the support of the MIT Portugal Program and aims to bring sustainability issues into the public debate.

Like at the previous edition, there are seven categories and a special prize to the competition:

Agriculture,
Sea and Tourism,
Research and Development,
Information Technology,
Efficient Management of Resources,
Product or Service,
Mobilization Initiative Award

And a special prize for an Original Writing, sponsored by the Society Green Point.

This year will also be a Youth Initiative category - Project 80, which will reward the Student Associations of Primary Schools and Secondary Education to develop environmentally sustainable projects.

On the other hand, the Green Project Awards Distinction - CPLP, whose goal is to distinguish an annual project between the winners of each edition of the GPA in the five Portuguese-speaking countries: Portugal, Brazil, Mozambique, Cape Verde and Angola.

Applications are open until May 31.

E3 Forum 2013 - Poster Competition

silvia.castro@mitportugal.org (Sílvia Castro) — Mon, 13 May 2013 14:18:07 GMT

The E3 Forum is now preparing its 3rd edition, which will happen on 27th June, 2013, so make sure you don’t miss this event.

E3 Forum is accepting innovative contributions for a Poster Competition to be held during the conference day. Although presentation happens via a poster format, participants are allowed and encouraged to bring other supporting materials such as prototypes. Just make sure to notify the E3 Poster Team of any desired supporting materials to ensure space is available, and safety requirements are met. Contributions for poster competition can be submitted in three categories:

"Most Innovative Product/Technology";
"Best Go-to-Market Strategy";
"Scientific Breakthrough".

If you can't fit your contribution in one of these categories please contact poster2013@e3forum.orgThis e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it . Four Awards will be issued on the day of the competition; one for each of the different categories and a fourth prize, the People’s Choice. Further details about E3 2013’s poster competition are available on our webpage.

E3 Forum is an international conference entirely promoted by PhD candidates from the MIT Portugal Program. E3 stands for Education, Employment and Entrepreneurship, the key fields where a young graduate will seek a professional career and which are the focus themes of this initiative. E3 Forum welcomes members from Academia, Companies, Educators, Entrepreneurs and Innovators, MSc or PhD students and any other attendees that may be interested in joining us. Venue will be held at the outstanding Pavilhão do Conhecimento - Ciência Viva, Lisbon.

E3 Forum's previous editions had an enthusiastic feed-back from public and audiences, having featured a total of 500 participants, 100 speakers and 60 companies’ representatives. Now in its third edition, E3 Forum will build a dynamic and interactional environment, featuring Inspiring Talks, Debate Sessions, Parallel Seminars, Working Sessions and Poster Competition, promoting the networking among all the participants.

Registrations and update program will soon be available at the website, so keep tuned for more information.

We look forward to seeing you there.

E3 Forum 2013

Communications Team | communication@e3forum.org

www.e3forum.org

www.facebook.com/ForumE3

www.linkedin.com/groups/E3-Forum-3875459

U.S. Ambassador to Portugal, Allan J. Katz, visits MIT

silvia.castro@mitportugal.org (Sílvia Castro) — Thu, 09 May 2013 16:52:33 GMT

The United States continues to work closely with Portugal to find ways to expand and deepen two-way trade and investment to better reflect historically strong political, geostrategic and security ties between the two countries. Portugal’s continued drive to modernize and diversify its economy will offer possibilities for growth in U.S. trade and investment over the medium and longterm. Demand for high-quality, price-competitive U.S. products in Portugal is strong, and privatization of several large government-owned companies will provide additional opportunities for investment.

[Also at MIT's website]

With the intent to encourage investment and bilateral trade between the United States and Portugal, with particular focus in the Azores, U.S. Ambassador to Portugal Allan J. Katz led a Business Development Road Show that included Massachusetts and Missouri. The MIT Portugal Program participated as a partner in this six-day event (April 28–May 3, 2013) bringing 24 Portuguese companies and institutions to Boston, Massachusetts and Kansas City, Missouri.

While in Boston on May 1st, the ambassador and the companies visited the Cambridge Innovation Center (CIC), the largest flexible office facility for growing technology and life sciences companies in the Greater Boston area. More than 450 companies are currently located at the CIC. This was followed by a meeting with the Mass Technology Leadership Council and the Mass High Technology Council. The Mass Technology Leadership Council is the region’s leading technology association and the premier network for tech executives, entrepreneurs, investors and policy leaders. The Mass High Technology Council is an advocate for competitive public policies and practices to sustain Massachusetts as a globally preeminent economy in which to live and work, and to create, operate and expand high tech businesses.

The coordination of the MIT Portugal Program at MIT, embodied by Jennifer Kratochwill and Flavia Cardarelli, led the visitors though the MIT Media Lab, an interdisciplinary research laboratory. Here, staff and students have backgrounds ranging from electrical engineering and computer science to sociology and music and others. The Media Lab has been widely popularized since the 1990s by business and technology publications such as Wired Red Herring wireless networks, field sensing, web browsers World Wide Web. More recently, it has also focused particularly on design and technologies that address social causes.

Jennifer Kratochwill and Flavia Cardarelli of the MIT Portugal Program led visitors though the MIT Media Lab, an interdisciplinary research laboratory. MIT Media Lab staff and students have backgrounds ranging from electrical engineering and computer science to sociology and music and others. Recently, the Media Lab has focused particularly on design and technologies that address social causes.

Later, MIT Portugal Program Director Professor Dava Newman, welcomed the ambassador and the companies. The convoy had lunch with MIT Portugal Program staff and students, including those involved in the eTeams III. The eTeams III is a 2-week intense “contact-sport” curriculum designed for non-US start-up companies to be exposed to, make lasting links within and gain practical entrepreneurial skills useful for the start-up culture of the MIT/Kendall Square ecosystem.This program exemplifies how the MIT Portugal Program harnesses the MIT’s ever-present entrepreneurial and innovative spirit.

Note to the press by the The U.S. Embassy in Lisbon is available at its website.

FEUP Professor and MPP faculty member awarded with IEEE Prize

silvia.castro@mitportugal.org (Sílvia Castro) — Tue, 07 May 2013 13:35:43 GMT

Vladimiro Miranda Professor of the Faculty of Engineering of University of Porto (FEUP), director of INESC TEC and MIT Portugal Program faculty member, was awarded with the “IEEE Power & Energy Society Ramakumar Family Renewable Energy Excellence Award” by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), the largest professional association of engineers in the USA.

The award aims to recognize outstanding contributions in the field of developing, utilizing and integrating renewable energy resources in the national and global energy scenarios and recognizes Professor Vladimiro Miranda contributions to renewable electricity systems over the last 20 years. For this distinction has contributed his work on integrating renewable energy sources, particularly wind power, large-scale electrical systems through traditional computational intelligence techniques.

The professor stressed that the award "to a non-American, on a peripheral country" is a form of "credibility of the Portuguese science" and "appreciation for the image of Portugal in the renewable energy sector”.

The “IEEE Power & Energy Society Ramakumar Family Renewable Energy Excellence” award will be delivered on the 23rd of July.

Portugal Ventures - 3rd Call For Entrepreneurship

silvia.castro@mitportugal.org (Sílvia Castro) — Mon, 06 May 2013 13:50:06 GMT

Portugal Ventures - 3rd Call For Entrepreneurship is now open. The initiative makes up to 750 000 Euros in venture capital available to each innovative scientific and technology-based project. Are eligible projects in sectors such as:

Information and Communication Technologies;
Electronics and WEB;
Life Sciences and Endogenous Resources;
Nanotechnologies and Materials.

Selected projects will benefit from a capital investment of up to 750 thousand Euros, with a maximum of 85% of each project’s budget.

All applications are to be submitted through the Portugal Ventures website until 30 May 2013.

Entrepreneurs may benefit from the support and guidance of one of the entities from the Ignition Partners Network in the preparation and qualification of the project, improving its investment readiness. In the first two Calls For Entrepreneurship over 600 entrepreneurs registered, resulting in the submission of almost 240 projects. The involvement of and encouragement given by the Partners Network was instrumental to this success. The network now counts with over 30 national entities from the scientific and technology-based entrepreneurship ecosystem.

The Call For Entrepreneurship is an initiative within the scope of the Ignition Programme, a key instrument in the entrepreneurship endeavour incorporated in the Portuguese government +E+I Programme (more entrepreneurship, more innovation). It aims to strengthen the Portuguese technology-based entrepreneurship ecosystem, encouraging the development of a modern, more competitive and open economy, based on knowledge, innovation and highly qualified human resources with a strong entrepreneurial spirit. Through this initiative, Portugal Ventures intends to invest 20 million Euros per year.

Read more about the Call For Entrepreneurship.

Contacts:

Email: callforentrepreneurship@portugalventures.pt

Tel.: +351 211 589 100

E3 Forum - 2013 Edition

silvia.castro@mitportugal.org (Sílvia Castro) — Tue, 30 Apr 2013 14:11:17 GMT

E3 Forum - 2013 will be held June, 27th. Pavilhão do Conhecimento, Lisbon, Portugal. Program will include: Inspiring Talks; Debate Sessions; Parallel Sessions; Working Sessions; Competition and Awards. This will be the 3rd Edition of the E3 Forum - international conference promoted by a team lead by PhD candidates from the MIT Portugal Program.

E3 stands for Education, Employment and Entrepreneurship. E3 represents the key fields where a young graduate will seek a professional career and are focus themes of this initiative. We are an informal gathering of enthusiastic, passionate and hard-working young people, willing to change the way society looks at the interactions within the scientific, educational and professional triangle.

The mission of E3 Forum is to add value to knowledge through the creation of synergies between students, the Academia, Industry, entrepreneurs, and policy makers. It is therefore an advantageous and inspiring environment for the discussion of strategic future directions for research, employment and entrepreneurship and to subsequently disseminate the outcome with the society (experts and non-experts, such as lawmakers and general public), bringing forth practical ideas, collaborations and action plans.

For up to date information do not forget to visit the initiative's website.

Applications for PhD and MSc are now closed

silvia.castro@mitportugal.org (Sílvia Castro) — Mon, 15 Apr 2013 16:19:26 GMT

Applications for PhD and MSc are now closed and any submissions after April 15th, 5 p.m. GMT will not be considered for evaluation.

This year, 377 candidates have submitted their applications for a MIT Portugal Program PhD or MSc, therefore considering our Program as the next step for a successful career.

Applications for the SES Executive Masters are still open until June 15th.

BGI 4th Edition - Open to all Innovators and Entrepreneurs!

silvia.castro@mitportugal.org (Sílvia Castro) — Wed, 10 Apr 2013 18:04:56 GMT

A new and thrilling edition is on with the same goal: help tech entrepreneurs working on the next generation of breakthrough technologies, products and services from around the world. If you are an entrepreneur working on something new and think you can put a dent in the universe, BGI is for you!

You can find more about the competition on the 16^th of April at Taguspark, 5 p.m. GMT .

The session coincides with the launch of 4^th Edition of BGI that will reward the four most innovative technology-based start-ups with financial support of up to one million euros.

The discussion panel devoted to "Challenges in launching new technology-based businesses" will bring together representative agents of the investment and incubation Portuguese ecosystem.

Admission is free but limited to existing places. Sign up here.

Program

17.00 Welcome Note by Professor Alberto Cunha, Taguspark

17h10 Panel discussion with :

Alberto Cunha, Taguspark
André Pina, Watt Intelligent Solutions & BGI alumnus
David Malta Cell2B BGI & alumnus
Gonçalo Amorim, Building Global Innovators
John Paul Champalimaud, Intercapital
Walter Palma, Caixa Capital

18:15 Networking

Location: Incubator Taguspark

More sessions are being organized at other venues. Consult the BGI’s website for more information.

May 14^th: Deadline for project's submission.