NTNU signs its biggest-ever industrial collaboration

Collaboration

NTNU has signed its biggest single research agreement with a company, and recorded a double first by making it the first in Norway to be signed “virtually” with the help of the university’s new Virtual Reality laboratory.

The Akademia Agreement between NTNU and StatoilHydro is a comprehensive cooperative programme for research and education, with financial support for student activities, PhD scholarships and professorships.

The agreement should also enhance international cooperation on the exploration for, and production of, oil and gas.

"The Academia Agreement is the result of many years of cooperative efforts among Statoil, Hydro and NTNU. This collaboration has helped to provide better conditions for education and research here at the university, through greater access to resources as well as access to relevant, real world problems,” said NTNU Rector Torbjørn Digernes.

The agreement extends over five years, and has a value of almost NOK 20 million (€2.2 million). It is one of eight signed by StatoilHydro with Norway’s higher education sector.

The agreement was signed in NTNU's new Virtual Reality laboratory at the Department of Petroleum Engineering and Applied Geophysics. The laboratory features equipment where virtual reality technology, real-time data acquisition and interdisciplinary collaboration are being used to develop models for how offshore and onshore operations will interact in future.

The remit of the laboratory is to enhance the quality of petroleum education at NTNU. Approximately NOK 10 million (€1.1 million) has been invested in the laboratory, with NOK 8 million (€880,000) coming from StatoilHydro.

A virtual signing of the agreement was conducted live between Trondheim and Bergen. Digernes was in Trondheim, while StatoilHydro’s executive vice president for technology and new energy, Margareth Øvrum, was in Bergen.