Under the motto “Successes and Challenges”, the EFRE Annual Event 2024 took place in Erfurt on November 28, 2024. The day before, Petra Corti, Programme Manager from the EU Commission’s Directorate-General for Regional Policy and Urban Development, Dr. Simone Zöphel, Deputy Head of the EFRE Administrative Authority at the Thuringian Ministry of Economic Affairs, Science and Digital Society, and Berit Beier (employee at the EFRE Administrative Authority of the TMWWDG) visited the CiS Forschungsinstitut in Erfurt’s south-east.
In a joint discussion with Thomas Brock, Managing Director of the CiS Research Institute, they discussed the successes and challenges of business-related research institutions in Thuringia. As a member of the Zuse community, the CiS Forschungsinstitut is a pillar of science transfer for sustainable and competitive innovations in a medium-sized economy. The prerequisite for this is a stable and reliable framework that also enables extensive investment.
The European Regional Development Fund (EFRE), a European Commission funding instrument for all European regions, provides valuable support for this. This has enabled the CiS Research Institute to set up a modern analytical center. At its core is a high-resolution 3-dimensional secondary ion mass spectrometry system (SIMS analysis cluster), which was financed with around 2 million euros from EFRE and state funds. During the tour, the guests were given a brief overview of the institute’s analytical portfolio.
Another focal point is the high-performance IT infrastructure along the entire value chain. Modern database systems, intelligent business and collaboration tools, comprehensive data analysis for more efficient design and production processes through to characterization and testing. Thanks to funding support from EU and state programs, further extensive measures can be taken. In this way, as well as through its business-oriented research and development services, the CiS Research Institute contributes to the achievement of climate protection targets at EU and national level through savings in raw materials, materials and energy and more efficient use of resources.
These topics, examples of success and future challenges were discussed at the annual conference at the Zentralheize Erfurt.