R3GROUP recently took part in “Future-Ready Manufacturing Starts with People,” a two-part webinar series organised by ai4manufacturing that brought together a cluster of EU-funded projects — including RaRe2, CREDIT, MULTIMOLD, RESTORE, VOLTAGE, RENÉE and BIOGEMSE alongside R3GROUP — to exchange insights on a question central to Europe’s industrial future: how can research results become real, sustainable, market-ready manufacturing solutions, starting from people?
Session 1: Skills, Mindset and Adoption of New Industrial Technologies
The first session put the human side of industrial transformation front and centre. Across the discussion, projects agreed that technology alone isn’t enough — skills, mindset and awareness are what actually drive adoption. Participants shared tools for mapping skills gaps, from structured surveys to interviews with managers and workers, and discussed how training needs to be adaptive and tailored to where each worker is starting from.
The barriers to adoption came up again and again: limited digital and technical skills, resistance to change, difficulty integrating new tools into existing systems, and low awareness of what’s actually available. The consensus was clear — adopting new technology is as much a cultural and organisational challenge as a technical one. Building a culture of collaboration and co-creation, through stakeholder engagement and participatory workshops, emerged as one of the most effective ways to close that gap.
Session 2: From Skills to Action — Training, Exploitation and Market Pathways
The second session shifted from understanding the challenge to acting on it, looking at how project results move from research into industrial uptake. Projects shared experiences from pilots and demonstrators tested in real company settings — a reminder that validation in real-world conditions is what makes a solution credible for industry.
The conversation also turned to exploitation: developing digital platforms and services, building business models, and partnering with industrial clusters. MULTIMOLD’s AVANTI solution was highlighted as a concrete example of a project result evolving into a market-oriented tool. A recurring theme was that training can’t stop when a project ends — to have lasting impact, it needs to be scalable, accessible to SMEs, and kept up to date.
Key Takeaways
Across both sessions, a few points stood out clearly:
- People come first — without the right skills and mindset, even the best technology won’t be adopted.
- Training is strategic, not just a support activity, but a real driver of long-term impact.
- Real-world validation is essential — pilots and demonstrators bridge the gap between research and market.
- Collaboration multiplies impact — stronger links between projects, companies and ecosystems help solutions scale.
- Exploitation has to be concrete, with clear pathways from results to usable, market-ready solutions.