Chairman of the committee Mr. Antonello MAREGA (R & D Director, TECNICA)

FESI has officially concluded that in addition to each company’s research and development activities, there is indeed a wide range of common, pre-competitive domains where sector collaboration is clearly a strategic bonus, such as:

• • Environment / Recycling: specific information on new materials / production process in eco and bio-friendly environment

  • Supply chain: product identification and traceability, RFID

  • Product quality / toxicity /Allergic issues

  • Qualitative standards biomechanical functionality, mechanical properties and material characteristic.

  • Studies and verifications on existing intellectual property rights

  • Scientific examination on specific social and age classes: children, women; elderly people; people with special needs

  • Consumer analysis: concerns and problems identification

  • Cross sector education and synergies finding

In addition, considering the substantial amount of financial resources available at the European Commission level for industry projects, it had become clear that a specific European working committee dedicated to the research & development domain had to be initiated.

The Research & Development working committee has recently identified the first most important aspect to concentrate on, namely:

• Analysis of the consumer evolution: trends and tendencies of social development with specific concern for different ages, classes and people with special needs.