CPT International 04/2014

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“Accelerate progress together – with open innovation“ AMAP GmbH (Advanced Metals and Processes) is a common foundation of Aachen university institutes and companies of the non-ferrous industry, set up in 2012. Its main purpose is research and development in close collaboration between industry and university institutes - no matter whether from Germany or abroad. In an interview with CP+T International, founding member and Advisory Board Chairman Prof. Wolfgang Schneider from Hydro Aluminum Rolled Products GmbH in Bonn, Germany, and the two AMAP Managing Directors, Dr. Rolf Weber and Dr. Peter von den Brincken, explain why open innovation plays such a key role What is open innovation? Prof. Wolfgang Schneider: It is a collaboration to create innovations within horizontal and vertical networks. Competitors, suppliers, customers and, for example, universities participate. Anyone who can make a contribution is included in open innovation. Like crowd-sourcing, what matters is to obtain as much information as possible from all sides and then make the most of it. It is important to generate a lot of ideas. Open innovation is the opposite of closed innovation, where companies develop their ideas behind closed doors. Only ideas already existing in companies are worked on. With closed innovation nothing is released to the outside because the employees are obliged to maintain confidentiality. With open innovation, on the other hand, many are involved and they mostly have already committed themselves to joint development objectives. Why is AMAP pushing the open innovation process? Schneider: The background to this is that the markets now force companies to create innovations in ever-shorter time periods. There are many who in the past and today exclusively bet on a closed innovation process. This is, how- 6 Casting Plant & Technology 4/2014
ever, dangerous. You can quickly lose touch and be swept out of the market when you, so to speak, stew in your own juices. In this regard, open innovation is also a form of insurance for future viability. And what we see again and again: the efforts that a company has to invest for this are limited. Is the choice then between closed innovation and open innovation? Dr. Rolf Weber: One does both of course: for the things that involve internal company expertise – when there is a competitive advantage – then of course one will continue to use the ‘closed’ system. In other cases, however, where it is noticed that one can do something together with others in order to make progress faster, to place an innovation on the market more quickly, then the open innovation process opens up opportunities. In short: there is not just this one or that one, each has its justification. What characterizes open innovation? Schneider: There is the congeniality that you obtain expertise in a development from people who do not belong to one’s own company but who make contributions and can accelerate development. This is a great thing, particularly for those companies who do not have major research and development capacities. And what differentiates open innovation from classic joint research projects in which several companies, research organizations or university institutes also collaborate? Schneider: You are right: classic joint research is also open innovation. But there is a very clear difference: the joint research projects proposed by the state (for example by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research, the Federal Ministry of Economics and Technology, or the European Union) are mainly founded by public money. AMAP is synonymous with 100 % industrial funding. Up to now we do not have any public funding. There are only the contributions from the member companies that finance our project work. And this means? Dr. Peter von den Brincken: This makes us more independent in many things. We are more flexible. We agree on a topic of mutual interest and when – let’s say after three years – this will have been completed we will develop a new subject of common interest. We are exclusively aligned upon the needs of our member companies. The public promotion of joint research projects, on the other hand, is strongly program-related and thus the range of topics is strongly restricted. Therefore it is more or less by chance if this precisely corresponds to the interests of one’s own company. Are your member companies competitors? Schneider: Of course. Aluminum companies, such as Novelis, Aleris, Constellium or Hydro Aluminium, are currently involved in the AMAP open innovation research cluster. These companies are all direct competitors in the market. Rolled products, for example, is one of the main business areas of Hydro Aluminium. This also applies for Novelis and Aleris. And despite this you all work together? Schneider: The collaboration generally involves pre-competitive research and development projects that are of interest for all. When a certain level of maturity has been reached, the result – a new simulation model for example – will be integrated in your own processes. But we do not have only these larger companies at AMAP’s, which here follow their own self-determined research interests. Small and medium-sized companies (SMEs) become members because they normally do not dispose of any research capacities or only have limited research capacities, but nevertheless they are forced to come up with innovations. At AMAP’s they can participate with relatively low expenses and share in developments that they could never achieve by own means. Open innovation provides these companies with access to knowledge and expertise that they lack and that they cannot generate on their own. Dr. Peter von den Brincken: “We are exclusively aligned upon the needs of our members” (Photos: U. Zillmann) Starting point and motivation for the founding of AMAP’s were the metallurgy, processing, application and recycling of aluminum? Weber: The motivation was to set up a research cluster in the area of non-ferrous metals to exploit the open innovation approach in order to work on future topics of joint importance for this industry and to enhance its innovative power. Whereby the initiative largely came from the industry itself. von den Brincken: This is why we founded the AMAP (Advanced Metals and Processes) research cluster in 2012 in the legal form of a GmbH under the umbrella of the aluminium engineering center (aec). The aec was founded in 2003 by ten enthusiastic Professors at RWTH Aachen University as a non-profit re gistered association. They all carried out intensive research in the area of aluminum, its alloys and its applications. At the heart of the aec there are colloquiums, seminars and workshops with industrial participation. This formal development pro- Casting Plant & Technology 4/2014 7
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