There were 20 talks, with an address from former University of Cambridge Vice-Chancellor Lord Broers and talks from industrialists Airbus, BP and Tata Steel and growth players Haydale and Cambridge-based Flexenable.
The two days were billed as the Cambridge Graphene Technology Days 2015 (with an ongoing hashtag of CGD15), with no fewer than six events taking place over the two days.
On the first day, the 2nd CIR Graphene & GRMs masterclass was attended by 30 senior corporate executives at the West Cambridge Site and there was in parallel a graphene technology showcase day with internal CGC partner meetings held by the Cambridge Graphene Centre.
The showcase with those CGC partners' technologies and also CIR exhibitors arrayed together for a very exciting press event at the end of the day, with director of CGC on stage with the University of Cambridge Vice Chancellor Professor Leszek Borysiewicz FRS and the Head of Engineering.
Later on the evening of 5th November, a joint dinner took place at Madingley Hall for CGC partners, as well as those who had attended the 2nd CIR Graphene Masterclass and were arriving to attend 3rd CIR Business Conference on Friday. Eighty delegates attended the dinner, around half each from CGC and CIR.
On the second day the 3rd CIR Graphene Business Conference was held for 100 business people. This followed an inaugural series CIR Graphene business conference also in Cambridge in November 2013, and other CIR Graphene events in May 2014 and February 2015. An excellent audience of delegates enjoyed entertaining presentations on stage, four panel Q&As and opportunities to network at breaks and at lunch hour at the next-door exhibition space, where around 40 companies were on show.
There were 20 talks throughout the day, from academics, dignitaries, large MNC business leaders in space, defence, oil & gas and steel, and scale-up materials solutions providers like Haydale and FlexEnable, and later interesting talks from venture capitalists, economists and intellectual property firms (Marks & Clerk LLP). Speakers were highly praised by feedback surveys by CIR.
During the masterclass, application projects of large firms and scale-ups were discussed among 30 graphene corporate executives with CIR Leader Nick Coutts and colleagues, in the context of Routes to Value. Routes to Value is a rigorous strategic method being used by large companies to ensure that projects are within a process that connects them explicitly with objectives, with values of the business (including culture) as constraints. This is a pioneering method that could add enormous value to the development of markets like graphene.
"I am delighted that Cambridge Investment Research was able to co-organise this set of events with the Cambridge Graphene Centre at this special time for the centre and for graphene, in particular, providing a highly business-focused aspect," said Dr Justin Hayward, Director of CIR. "Of the 35 conferences we have run since 2002, this was definitely one of the most interesting!"
For a longer write-up of 20 talks given at the 3rd CIR Graphene Business Conference please click on CGD15.
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