On 25.11.2022 the steering committee (project coordinators and scientific directors) held a two-hour meeting to conclude the annual symposium 2022 at IITB in Mumbai, India. At the beginning of the meeting, Prof. Frank-Martin Belz thanked the IITB team for their outstanding organization and hosting of the annual symposium 2022 at their institution. Afterward, the meeting proceeded by resuming the annual symposium 2022 and planning the upcoming symposium in 2023, which will be held at Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology in Kumasi, Ghana from 04.-8.09.2023. The structure of the 2023 symposium will be similar to the 2022 symposium, additionally containing professional development workshops on sustainable entrepreneurship and sustainable energies. Moreover, organizational matters regarding the reimbursement of expenditures for the symposium 2022 and the reporting of Key Performance Indicators were discussed.
In his presentation, Prof. Belz specifically emphasized the expansion of academic exchange between the partner universities. Therefore, workshops focusing on south-south cooperation are planned for 2023, to enhance academic exchange between the partner universities in the global south. Furthermore, in cooperation with Esther Salvi, Prof. Belz wants to gather data from villagers profiting from the living lab, in order to research what impact the provision of energy has on their entrepreneurial endeavors. The coming months will show, which living labs will be chosen for study.
However, while academic exchange related to research should be enhanced, Prof. Belz also stressed the importance to ameliorate the exchange in regard to teaching. Therefore, two Ph.D. candidates from the TUM SEED Center are going to offer seminars. The first seminar will be held by Prashant Pant on the topic of “Design and Modelling Mini-Grids”. The seminar will be held online and will be available for students at partner universities at the bachelor and master's levels. Dhirendra Mishra wants to offer a seminar on “Frugal Innovation” for which ten mobility grants will be made available for interested and committed students from partner universities. To enhance academic exchange on a student level the TUM SEED Center wants to support the establishment of student organizations at the partner universities, focusing on the topics of sustainable energies and energy provision in their countries.
Lastly, Prof. Belz introduced Lara Knödler as the new TUM SEED Center project coordinator. With Lara taking over the role as project coordinator all communication should be directed towards her (lara.knoedler@tum.de) and will then be discussed bilaterally with Prof. Belz. Lastly, the meeting ended by announcing the upcoming meeting of the steering committee, which will be held on 20.01.2023.