The Ambassador’s lecture “How Kaunas could learn from the success story of entrepreneurship of Haifa” was attended by large number of researchers, students and young business professionals.
Amir Maimon shared experience from Israel and Haifa city and told about shaping an attractive high-tech business environment and attracting investment from the most famous companies in the world.
The lecture was followed by a panel discussion, in which Israeli ambassador Amir Maimon, MEP Gabrielius Landsbergis, KTU vice-rector for International Relations and Development Sigitas Stanys and KTU startup „Solid Education“ founder Paulius Paškevičius shared their ideas.
They discussed challenges, faced by high-tech business community in Lithuania and Israel and shared experience on the opportunities. The conclusion was made that Lithuania and Israel are similar in constantly growing numbers of start-up companies and financial encouragement for young businesses.
Academic and Human Links Between KTU and the University of Haifa
KTU scholars from Social Sciences have maintained close links with the University of Haifa, Israel for more than 15 years, when professor Palmira Jucevicienė (field of Education) and Professor Robertas Jucevicius (field of Management) started academic collaboration with Professor Hanan Alexander from Haifa. Later it evolved also into personal friendships.
The collaboration resulted in working on several research publications and monographies, guest-lecturing and joint projects. Hanan Alexander visited KTU on several occasions as a visiting professor; he was also an official PhD student supervisor.
“The collaboration has been recognised as a good step towards double doctoral degree in the field of Education, and the outcome of the long-term academic links between the professors from two universities was the official statement of cooperation between KTU and Haifa University”, said Professor Palmira Jucevičienė.
In 2015 the ERASMUS plus project “Developing programs for access of disadvantaged groups of people and regions to higher education” (DARE) has started with the initiative and coordination by the University of Haifa and the partnership by KTU, as well as other universities and colleges from Israel, Georgia and Spain. The project will be finished in 2018.
