Achieving our vision

“By working as an agent of change, our vision bringing about change through the research support is articulated even more clearly. What that means for our activities in practice is something we are working on,” says Bengt Kasemo, chairman of VREF’s Scientific Council.

In 2006, six Centres of Excellence (CoE) had been established and a large number of Smaller Projects had been funded. It was time to assess the work and modes of operation in order to develop the strategy for the coming years.

Accordingly, VREF commissioned an evaluation by Technopolis, an international consulting company specialized in evaluating research, development and innovation. Technopolis concluded that, “FUT has identified a distinctive and important topic, funded a significant body of international research and begun to have a demonstrable impact on urban transportation at the level of planning and early demonstration." However, another important finding was that FUT can increase its effectiveness by requiring the CoEs to put more effort into tool building, education, dissemination, and networking to bring its collective resources to bear on the FUT problem.

Becoming an agent of change

The goal of the FUT program is for results from excellent research to be put to practical use in influencing the development of sustainable transportation systems. Technopolis therefore recommended that financial support for the CoE might be extended from five years to eight. Five years is a relatively short period for the CoE to establish relationships with end users and with each other. Longer financing periods for a CoE must be weighed against the structure of the CoE portfolio as a whole in terms of the number of CoE and their geographical location. VREF has yet, for example, to establish a CoE in South America.

The Technopolis evaluation also recommends that VREF see itself to a larger extent as an agent of change, rather than just a financer of research. Being a financer could be just a passive role, once the best proposals have been identified. But one can also be an agent of change, which is a more demanding role, requiring an active dialogue with the CoE individually and as a network. Today VREF requires that every CoE collaborates with local actors in the region and society that the researchers are studying. The Centers function to some extent as disseminators of knowledge that influence actors and opinion. Technopolis also recognizes that the formation of such a CoE network has already started and regards this as a major achievement. A further option for VREF to strengthen its role is to shift from open calls to targeted calls for proposals in areas that VREF has identified as particularly important but not yet adequately covered within the portfolio of CoE. Technopolis also recommended that the Smaller Projects, which are “somewhat fragmented," be more closely tied to the Centers so that they more clearly contribute to achieving the program´s goals.

Disseminating information

Furtermore Technopolis strongly recommends that VREF develop a range of information material and channels in order to become more visible. This article is one part of the effort to address this issue. Another is this new website that is more informative and rich in information and updated continuously. The purpose is to reach out to both researchers and practitioners.

2010