Vallourec launches its Open Innovation platform to create new partnerships with innovative companies
BOULOGNE-BILLANCOURT -- Vallourec has launched its Open Innovation Platform, a website designed to create new partnerships to produce “augmented” pipes.
An “augmented” pipe features new functionalities, in addition to its main function of transporting fluids safely and providing a structural component.
This year, Vallourec hopes to develop pipes with two new features for:
- Enhancing the flow of fluids inside the pipes
- Conveying information and/or power via the pipes
Solutions to these two challenges will be studied as a priority. However, all proposed innovative solutions will be taken into consideration.
Proposals submitted up to September 24, 2019 will be pre-selected. Candidates with pre-selected proposals will be invited to present their project on October 24, 2019. Decisions on the final selection will be released at the end of November. The collaborative workshops with the winning start-ups, labs and/or companies will start around mid-January 2020.
“Through its new Open Innovation Platform, Vallourec is demonstrating its commitment to developing regular partnerships with agile, leading-edge companies on new technologies. We believe that new technologies represent great opportunities. We would like to combine them with our internal skills to offer differentiating solutions for our customers and consolidate Vallourec’s leadership over the long term”, says Sylvie Dubois-Decool, group innovation director.
New digital technologies, effective micro-sensors, quick surface treatment, additive manufacturing and even new smart coatings all provide opportunities to expand the features of the pipes to meet our customers’ need to maximize the use and the profitability of their projects.
The Open Innovation platform comes within the scope of Vallourec’s initiatives in terms of open innovation. Vallourec paved the way for open innovation several decades ago, leading to the first VAM connections developed through a partnership. The open innovation strategy has been especially strengthened for the past 3 years, through a partnership with Saagie on big data developments in 2016, and open innovation challenges organized in 2017, one in Brazil, the other worldwide.
