The purpose of the trip was to strengthen existing contacts with the Chinese universities and discuss research areas of mutual interest. According to Brinksma, the UT counts on China as a main target country with tremendous possibilities for collaborative research with master tracks, double degree courses, exchange students and scientists with its 1.3 billion inhabitants. ‘We already knew, but now we have established through our visit that the universities really want to do business with us; maybe even next year. It’s no longer formal pleasantries.’
Brinksma flew from mainland China to Taiwan, where he joined the National Chiao Tung University (NCTU) and signed a formal memorandum of understanding which is a mutual intention to work together. The NCTU is a top technical university, said Brinksma, and a leader in semiconductors. The rector expects to get a letter of intention from ‘Shanghai’ and ‘Nanjing’ universities.
The next step, according to the rector, is to make an inventory list to identify promising cooperation projects. For example, ‘In Nanjing, there is a huge program running in the
field of biomedical engineering and our Institute MIRA can benefit from their expertise.’
He mentioned other interests for the UT are to explore a cooperation are in the fields of electrical engineering, computer science and lasers, 'but there are also opportunities for the Faculty ITC and Institute IBR.’
