Excavating ideas, energizing exchanges in human and material resources in the field of R & D, fostering outstanding students.

An Idea factory in KIU (Kang Hyung Gu, a leader) and KAIST Institute for Social Science and Technology Innovation (Lee Hong Gyu, a leader) confirmed an agreement at the conference room in the main building in KIU on March 9th.

With the help of this agreement, both institutes will work together to facilitate idea development, energize exchanges in human and material resources in the field of R&D, and foster outstanding students. In order to do these, they decided to promote human interchange through workshops or visit each other's campuses, participate in studies, and conduct research activities together.

Before this agreement, both institutes held a '3 Day Workshop' under the title of the 'Arduino' (the technology producing environmentally interchangeable items) at KAIST in Daejeon from last January 25th to 27th. This is because they would like to cultivate and commercialize creative ideas based on the amalgamative thinking among universities and various academic fields

This workshop included undergraduate students from KIU and researchers from KAIST Institute for Social Science and Technology Innovation which made up teams and demonstrated numerous and experimental ideas and products at the '3 Day Workshop'

These products were linked with the abilities and skills of design and knowledge of liberal arts and they attracted people's attention

Among these products, a few of them are about to start up their own business and commercialize their items such as 'an automatic flash adjusting intensity of illumination in cameras linked with smart phones' and ' moving furniture based on noise complaint Issues'

Professor Kang, the leader of the idea factory project and the professor of thedesign department, said that "we are very much looking forward to doing the groundwork for attracting more students for start-up through the original design from an Idea Factory business team and KAIST Institute for Social Science and Technology Innovation's technical skills.

'The idea factory project' managed by the Ministry of Trade has selected 10 universities to organize the project since 2015. It has allowed students to industrialize their start up ideas with the professional consulting from government.

This so called ' Idea factory Project' provides students with trial goods and transfers skills to small companies which can lead to start up business for students.

KIU is the only university that has been performing this project, getting supported funding (a total of $900 million from 2015 to 2018) around Daegu and the Gyungpook Province.