On April 20, 2023, the Balling Hall of the National Technical Library was the venue for the Final Opposition Procedure of the National Centre of Competence in ENGINEERING (NCKS) project, which was supported by the National Centre of Competence 1 Programme of the Czech Technology Agency (TAČR).

The four-year project, which ended in December 2022, aimed at research, development and innovation activities in the field of medium and light engineering. Specific activities, addressed through sub-projects, were directed at increasing the performance and precision of machinery and equipment, reducing energy consumption, automating production processes, shortening innovation cycles, taking into account Industry 4.0 trends.

NCKS in numbers:

- 9 research organisations

- 19 industrial enterprises

- 55 sub-projects

- 135 results

Prof. Ing. Miroslav Václavík, CSc., principal investigator of the NCKS project and director of VÚTS a.s., which coordinated the whole project. "One of the objectives of the Centre was to improve and develop cooperation between companies and research organisations. I am very glad that even with such a large number of consortium members, we have managed to successfully fulfil this goal," said Prof. Václavík at the beginning of the ceremony.

In the first presentation the project manager, Ing. Jaromír Ficek, Ph.D., introduced the project, the individual members of the consortium and provided summary information on the progress of the project. This was followed by presentations of selected results of the sub-projects by representatives of industrial companies Modelárna Liaz spol. s r.o., TOS Varnsdorf a.s., Zebra Group s.r.o., TOS Kuřim-OS, a.s., Nano Medical s.r.o., TOSHULIN a.s., Proinno a.s., Wikov Gear s.r.o. and representatives of research organizations. "Cooperation with partners in research and development is strategic for us - those who do not develop do not move forward. Research organisations come up with interesting and innovative ideas, industrial companies then have the task of helping to put these solutions into industrial practice," said Ing. Tomáš Kozlok, Head of Development Projects and Testing at TOS Varnsdorf a.s.

Prof. Ing. Petr Konvalinka, CSc., FEng. (Chairman of TA ČR), Ing. Petr Očko, Ph.D. (Chief Director of the Digitization and Innovation Section, MIT), Ing. Roman Dvořák (project rapporteur, TA ČR) and Ing. František Kubelka (consultant in charge, TA ČR).

"I would like to thank all the members of the consortium for the excellent work done during the project and I strongly hope that we will build on the excellent results in the next six years in the continuation of the project supported in the 2nd public competition of the NCK Programme," concluded Prof. Václavík.

TA ČR presentation video about the project:
Program NCK: Národní centrum kompetence strojírenství - YouTube

Project information:
Jednoduché vyhledávání - IS VaVaI