The University of Beira Interior (UBI) and Jiaxing University in China have signed two agreements to deepen co-operation in teaching and research, particularly in engineering. The documents were signed during a visit by the Chinese delegation to the Portuguese city of Covilhã on 14 October.

UBI Rector Ana Paula Duarte and Yu Jianming, head of the Jiaxing University delegation, signed a memorandum of understanding to prepare for the establishment of a Chinese-Foreign Cooperative Education Institute in Jiaxing. The plans include a future joint application to China’s Ministry of Education for the institute’s formal establishment. UBI engineering courses would initially be taught there.

The two sides also signed a letter of intent to establish the Zhejiang–Portugal Joint Laboratory for Multimodal Perception and Intelligent Robotics. The initiative provides for joint research, advanced training, and the mobility of researchers and students. A future application to the Zhejiang Provincial International Joint Laboratory Cooperation Project is also planned.

The co-operation also covers areas such as artificial intelligence, autonomous systems, advanced manufacturing, energy, mechatronic systems and information technology.

Pedro Dinis Gaspar, who co-ordinates UBI’s links with Jiaxing University, said that the two documents complement each other in teaching and research. The partnership could facilitate access to funding in China, strengthen academic mobility and enable new postgraduate programmes under joint supervision.

(Source: University of Beira Interior, 21 October)