An institutional and business delegation from the Valencian town of Ontinyent, headed by Mayor Jorge Rodríguez, visited the facilities of the Science Park of the Universitat de València interested in the potential of this ecosystem of innovation and the possibilities of establishing links with the region of Vall de Albaida, a substantially industrial area where the Universitat has a campus too. The mayor was joined by the councillor for Economic Promotion, Juan Pablo Úbeda; the president and secretary of the Vall d'Albaida Business Confederation (COEVAL), Javier Cabedo and Vicent Donat; and the president and secretary of the Association of Textile Entrepreneurs of the Valencian Community (ATEVAL), Rafael Lurbe and Felipe Carrasco.

The government and business representatives of the region have access to data on scientific-technological and business activity carried out in the PCUV by 7 research institutes, 2 singular centres and 91 companies. From the hand of Mª Dolores Real, vice-rector of Innovation and Transfer; Carlos Hermenegildo, vice-rector of Research; Jorge Hermosilla, vice-rector of Territory and Society and Joan Enric Ubeda, Director of the Office of the Rector, Marketing and Institutional Communication Universitat de València, have known the value of concentrating research and business in the same space. "The current management team of the Universitat de València has a strong commitment to the third mission of the university, which is the transfer of knowledge, based on three main axes: innovation, entrepreneurship and social commitment," said Vice Chancellor Mª Dolores Real, who has reiterated the commitment of the Universitat with the territorial development of València "within the framework of a new and necessary production model that sustains our welfare society.

For his part, the mayor of Ontinyent, Jorge Rodriguez, has reiterated the commitment of his government to promote the presence of the Science Park in Ontinyent, raising different possibilities that allow the installation of a headquarters in the city, which would help to close the circle of university activities currently being developed in the Ontinyent Campus: teaching, research, culture and sports. In this way, the dimension of innovation would be added to the transfer of knowledge already initiated with the Institutional Chair that has its headquarters on this university campus.

In this regard, the director of the PCUV, Juan Antonio Raga, and the manager of the Fundació Parc Científic Universitat de València (FPCUV), Fernando Mª Zárraga, have raised possible lines of collaboration. On the one hand, they proposed that the companies already created could develop innovative lines with the advice of the university, specifically its research groups. To this end, the FPCUV has proposed organising "scientific-technological networkings in which companies present their challenges and institutes explain their lines of research with the aim of finding possible transfer links. These meetings have been successful with companies such as Repsol, Aguas de València and Embutidos Martínez, among others", explained Fernando Mª Zárraga.

Seedbed of Companies

And, on the other hand, "we can also address the creation in Ontinyent of a space to generate new business in areas that have an innovative component. To do this, it would be necessary for the council to promote a program to promote innovative entrepreneurship to which the Science Park would provide support and advice to develop," he continued.

In order to see how this innovative centre works, they visited the facilities of the biotechnology company Biopolis, a company acquired by the American food multinational ADM and an innovation centre for probiotics, directed by Daniel Ramon Calvo. They then got to know first-hand the developments of the University Institute of Robotics Research and Information Technologies (IRTIC), where they were received by its director, Professor Marcos Fernández. There they have been able to see technological developments carried out by the Universitat de València in the field of textiles, which is one of the industrial sectors with the greatest presence in the region of Vall d'Albaida.