News archive 2006

The first FP7 Call for proposals on Information and Communications Technologies (ICT Call 1) has been officially published today. Proposals addressing seven identified “Challenges”, but also future and emerging technologies, and horizontal support actions, have to be submitted before May 8, 2007. An indicative budget of around 1 000 M€ is expected to be devoted to the funding of the proposals that will be selected following an open evaluation procedure (contract negotiations being planned in June/July 2007). Research on ICT is an important part of the Cooperation programme under FP7, with a budget of around 9 000 M€ out of a total budget of around 32 000 M€ over the 2007-2013 period. International dimension is an integral part of FP7 (short name for “the seventh Framework Programme for research and technological development”) and organisations from third countries are invited to participate in the programme. The launch of ICT Call 1 should therefore pave the way to important cooperation opportunities between European and Chinese organisations. For detailed information, please visit the FP7 website or contact us.

Chinese authorities and organisations have been very significantly involved in the IST2006 event, held in Helsinki from November 21 to 23, 2006. First, Dr Wu Zhongze, Vice-Minister of MOST (the Chinese Ministry of Science and Technology), was invited to give a keynote address during the opening session of the conference. Then, during the three days, event delegates were invited to visit three exhibition stands devoted to Chinese developments in the ICT field on the following themes: "Digital Technology", "China's FuTURE Project" and "National Information stand for the People's Republic of China". Another stand, the “EU-Asia S&T cooperation” information stand, managed by the CHINACOOP IST project, also welcomed visitors interested in getting updated and detailed information on the status and perspectives of the EU-Asia cooperation at large, and of the EU-China cooperation in particular. Last, but not least, a “EU-China cooperation networking session”, moderated by Mr Roger Torrenti, CEO of Sigma Consultants and coordinator of the CHINACOOP IST project, had been organised and attracted over 100 attendees. After an introductory speech from Mr Roger Torrenti, Ms Alison Birkett, Scientific Counsellor for the Information Society at the European Delegation in Beijing, delivered a welcome address, followed by a keynote address from Mr Wen Ku, Director General of the Department of Science and Technology at the Chinese Ministry of Information Industry (MII) introducing "Today and Future for Information Industry in China". Two other presentations from MII representatives followed, detailing the "Status and Trends of Wireless and Mobile Communications in China" and "Standardization of OSS - Promoting OSS in China by Standardization". The networking session ended through a lively Q&A session which was also the occasion to give visibility to many projects or initiatives addressing cooperation between the EU and China in the ICT field (presented in a document available here). For further information please contact us.

The next “EU-China cooperation” networking session will be held on Nov. 22 (4:00-5:30 pm / Room #216) at the Helsinki Fair Center. This networking session is organised by the European Commission and the Chinese authorities in the framework of the IST2006 event; the 2006 edition of the yearly IST conference and exhibition which will be held in Helsinki, Finland, on Nov. 21-23, 2006. This session will allow the audience to get a comprehensive overview of the status and perspectives of the S&T cooperation between the EU and China in the ICT sector. Opportunities for a broader and a deeper cooperation will be introduced. Open discussions and networking will also be strongly encouraged. An important Chinese delegation will be represented with delegates from the Chinese Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST), the Chinese Ministry of Information Industry (MII), the Beijing Municipal Office of Informatisation (BMOI) and the Beijing Organizing Committee for the Games of the XXIX Olympiad (BOCOG). The preliminary agenda of the session is available here. Should you be interested in this session, we kindly ask you to express your interest on the IST2006 dedicated website. Opportunities to describe your EU-China cooperation projects/initiatives/visions are offered. Selected contributions will then be printed out and disseminated to session attendees. For further information, please contact us.

The 2006 edition of the IST conference and exhibition - IST2006 - the yearly event organised by the European Commission in cooperation with the Finnish Presidency of the European Union, will be held in Helsinki, Finland, on Nov. 21-23, 2006 and will have two main goals:
- bring key policy-makers together from across Europe to discuss a holistic policy approach to European ICT development
- explore how tomorrow's future ICT technological, business and social challenges will be addressed by FP7, the EU's 7th Framework Programme for Research (2007-2013)
The European Commission and the Chinese authorities are organising in the framework of IST2006 a “EU-China Cooperation” networking session. This networking session will be devoted to the status and perspectives of the S&T cooperation between the EU and China in the ICT sector. Ongoing projects, supported in particular by the European Commission and MOST (the Chinese Ministry of Science and Technology), will be introduced. Opportunities for broader and deeper cooperation in the framework of FP7 and of Chinese programmes will also be introduced and open discussions and networking will be encouraged. Should you be interested in this session, we kindly ask you to express your interest on the IST2006 dedicated website. For further information, please contact us.

IPDM06, the “Europe-China conference on Intellectual Property in Digital Media”, will be organised from October 18 to 20, 2006 at the Crowne Plaza Pudong Hotel in Shanghai, at the initiative of the recently founded DMSD (Digital Media Sustainable Development) EEIG (European Economic Interest Grouping). Co-chaired by Professor Wen GAO, head of the Chinese delegation to MPEG and of Dr Leonardo Chiariglione, father of MP3 and convenor of MPEG, the event aims at “launching and fostering an effective debate on new ways to enhance the value of IP in Digital Media at the age of industry convergence”. A call for papers has been launched and sponsoring opportunities are proposed to European and Chinese companies and institutions. For full details, please visit the event dedicated website.

The 2nd “Euro-China workshop on home networks and platforms” was held yesterday at the Nikko New Century Hotel in Beijing, organised by Homega Research and CECO under the aegis of the European Commission (DG Information Society and Media) and of the Chinese Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST), in the framework of the BIP2 IST project. The first edition of the event had been organised in April 2004 in Beijing, attracting around 70 European delegates. These last two years, the markets for home networks and platforms have been developing quite rapidly in China and the EU-China cooperation framework in the ICT area has been more and more propitious, which may explain the full success of the second edition of the event, attracting over 240 participants, including 100 from Europe. In fact all European and Chinese companies, universities, institutions active in the field of home networking had sent delegates to the event, around 20 organisations exhibiting their last developments in an exhibition area connected to the conference room. Over 40 contributions have been presented in plenary sessions, while ample time was left in the programme to visit the exhibition and network. On May 30, over 40 European delegates took advantage of the technical visits kindly arranged for them by Lenovo, Haier, and BUPT. An on-site survey of event delegates has revealed that a number of EU-China cooperation projects should be developing in the short term, which a next edition of the workshop might usefully allow to review and support. The event agenda and proceedings are available on request to European and Chinese organisations. For further information, please visit the workshop dedicated website.

ChinICT 2006 is a Euro-Chinese event to promote innovation between Europe and China in the ICT field. The 2-day event will be held in Beijing on May 25 & 26, 2006 at the Crowne Plaza hotel. Within this mark-up, the most innovative and fastest growing ICT companies from both China and Europe are currently being selected and will be presented during the event. The main Chinese and European players from the corporate, education and financial worlds will be highly represented at this occasion (among the sponsors: Tsinghua Tongfang, ZTE, Huawei, France Telecom, Sina, etc.). The event will also include several high profile keynote speakers such as: Mr. Wang Yan (CEO and co-founder of Sina.com), Larry Lee (Associate President of Tsinghua Tongfang), Mr. Serge Abou (Ambassador of the EU in China), Mr. Lin Jintong (President of Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications), Mrs. Christine Lagarde (Minister Delegate of Foreign Trade), etc.
For more details, please visit: http://www.chinict.org or contact the organisers (Franck Nazikian)

Thanks to the high number of received “Search for partners” forms (filled in both by European and Chinese organisations) the associated section of the website (search for partners) is now fully operational. This dedicated section of the EuroChina-ICT.org website is aiming at facilitating contacts between European and Chinese organisations interested in the development of R&D cooperation projects through a search engine allowing to get information on organisations looking for partnerships. We sincerely hope you will find this service useful to the development of your cooperation projects. “Search for partners” forms can still be filled in and, once processed, inserted into this on-line database. For further information, please contact us.