Researchers at the Institute of Social Sciences and Applied Informatics of Kaunas Faculty of Vilnius University are implementing the project “Transnational cooperation initiative fostering developing forward thinking skills of students, teachers and workforce in sustainability-relevant sectors posed by Business 4.0 trends through innovation in Business & Engineering education and training”. From 8-12 May 2023, the project participants, Assoc. Prof. Dr Ilona Kiaušienė and Administrator Vaidilutė Kaminskienė, attended in a training course at the University of Western Attica, Athens, Greece.
During the training, Nektaria Marava (StartUPiraeus, project manager), who has participated in many European and national research programmes on territorial and urban governance, spoke about the importance of the blue economy for the country’s development, highlighting the role that some Greek cities play in the implementation of the country’s Blue Economy Strategy. George Pantoulas and Elias Letsios presented LINKED, an award-winning employee engagement app that brings the employee experience to wherever employees are in the company. The transformation of Egaleo, a city in central Greece, western Athens, located on the Kefis River, into a smart city was also discussed (infrastructure, economy, lighting network, use of sensors and modelling, entrepreneurial centres, spaces for beginners, etc.); as well as the possibilities of the Isalos Analytics platform. Isalos is a software that offers a user-friendly and ready-to-use environment for machine learning applications. It provides a wide range of functionalities covering a wide range of standard data processing procedures. Isalos tabs act like nodes: data are imported and exported in tabular format, and in between they are processed and transformed using specific functions.
The skills that distinguish cognitive systems (understanding, reasoning, learning), AI applications, and how AI can be applied in business (Dr Lilian Balatsou) were discussed. Charalampos Manousiadis (researcher, project manager) discussed Industry 4.0 and digital tools, the transition towards circularity and sustainability. Prof. Alessio Alonne (InforElea, Italy) sought an answer to the question “Is metaverse directly related to virtual and augmented reality?” and Prof. Emma Selene Ixchel Iturriaga Sauco (InforElea, Italy) spoke about the art of questioning and presented a model for multi-dimensional collaboration in the age of artificial intelligence. Dr Mihai Pascadi (AVANTERA, Romania) identified the advantages and disadvantages of Chat GPT, etc.
The participants visited the StartUPiraeus Support Centre, the HP Incubator-Centre at the University of Western Attica, etc. The StartUPiraeus Support Centre was launched in 2021, as a local innovative action of Piraeus Blue Strategy 2018-2024. The aim is to gradually establish a formal institutional organisation offering consultancy services to accelerate blue innovation in Piraeus. It aims to inspire, empower and support businesses, especially start-ups and emerging companies, to create and scale up game-changing innovations with an emphasis on the blue economy.
The project is coordinated by the Polytechnic University of Bucharest (Romania) and implemented with partners from Italy, Slovenia, Lithuania and Greece. The aim of the project is to support the development of forward thinking skills of students, teachers and workforce by designing, deploying and scaling-up the Educational Initiative (future-oriented curricula) facilitating innovation in business & engineering education and training, intercultural knowledge exchanges in various sustainability-relevant sectors of Business 4.0 and enhancing civic and responsible behavior.
More about project SMART skills 4.0: https://www.smartskills4.com/
Grant Agreement: 2020-1-RO01-KA203-080019
Assoc. Prof. Dr Ilona Kiaušienė
Institute of Social Sciences and Applied Informatics