The kick-off meeting of the FOSTEX project took place at The School of Industrial, Aeronautical and Audiovisual Engineering of Terrassa (ESEIAAT), from the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya, from February 18^th to 20^th.

FOXTEX project is co-financed by the European Commission's ERASMUS + program under the Capacity Building for higher education program with the Grant Agreement number 598347-EPP-1-2018-1-ES-EPPKA2-CBHE-JP.

The project started on January 15^th 2019, it has a duration of 3 years and a total budget of 999.901€.

The project coordinator is the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC) and it counts with the participation of AEI TÈXTILS, the Catalan cluster of technical textiles, also established in Terrassa. Five additional partners complete the European part of the consortium: the University of West Attica (UNIWA) and CRE.THI.DEV in Greece, Materials Connexion and CIAPE in Italy, and the INCDTP research center in Romania. The partnership is completed with six partners from Jordan (the Jordan University of Science and Technology, the Al-Balqa Applied University and the Amman Chamber of Commerce) and from Morocco (ESITH from Casablanca, University Hassan II of Casablanca and AMITH, the largest Moroccan textile association).

FOSTEX project aims to fill the gap in the area of specialized services for the textile sector, with the establishment of four advanced textiles’ centers located at the participating Higher Education Institutions both in Jordan and in Morocco. These centers will play the role of focal points for the textile sector and relevant stakeholders to bloom innovations and promoting entrepreneurship.

The aim of the project is to establish a collaboration between the participating European organizations and the ones in Jordan and Morocco, by creating a network which may benefit the textile industry in the countries involved in the project.

The kick off meeting started on Monday February 18^th with the presentation of each of the individual organizations that compose the partnership where each representative highlighted their motivations for the project.

Cluster Manager of AEI Tèxtils presenting the Catalan Technical textiles’ cluster during the kick off meeting

During the second day, the responsible for each work package reviewed the planed work that is upcoming during the next months.

​​​​​​​Members of the FOSTEX project consortium at UPC Terrassa during the Kick Off meeting

Lastly, on Wednesday February 20th the consortium visited the facilities of the UPC in Terrassa dedicated to the textile sector during the morning and completed the tour visiting the technological center LEITAT also in Terrassa.

Members of the FOSTEX project consortium visiting the facilities dedicated to the textile sector in UPC