March 2006: Delegation from the 22@Barcelona project visits UCI.

Miquel Barcelo, Chairman of the 22@ project, Vicente Lopez, Director General of 22@Barcelona Media, and Xavier Kirchner, Director of Innovation of Telefonica visited UCI to discuss collaborations related to technology transfer and the California-Catalonia Engineering Innovation Program. They met with Roger Rangel, Director of the California-Catalonia Engineering Program, and Pete Balsells of Bal Seal Engineering and founder of the Balsells Fellowship program. The 22@Barcelona project will transform the Poblenou industrial district of Barcelona into an innovative economic district with the aim of creating an important scientific, technological and cultural axis. This change will consolidate Barcelona into a platform for innovation within the knowledge-based economy at an international level. 22@Barcelona consists of mixed-use urban areas where production goes hand-in-hand with centers for research, training and technology transfer, as well as shops, houses and open space. The transformation will utilize 200 hectares of industrial land into an economic district with leading edge infrastructure. It will offer over three million square meters of modern, flexible, technological business space in the very center of Barcelona, and is to achieve a strategic concentration of knowledge intensive activities. A follow up meeting in Barcelona is planned later this year as well as another meeting with former Balsells fellows. For additional information on the 22@Barcelona see http://www.bcn.es/22@bcn/pdf/22@_state_execution.pdf.