Robotics outreach and investor engagement
30 November 2017
Cohort 3 researcher Chris Kouppas, had the opportunity to represent his co-sponsor Motion Robotics and showcase his work at two large exhibitions, New Scientist Live and Innovate 2017. Chris had the following to say about each event
In this event we had the opportunity to speak with the end-users (general public) and discuss about their needs and opinions about having a robot in their home. During the event I got more comfortable about my PhD and what people think about that area. The company benefitted from suggestions of the customers, e.g. the robot feet look too bulky and in our next exhibition we made it smaller.
At this event, the main aim was to meet future investors. I got experience talking with business and companies that need to make collaboration either for the end product or on-going research. We ran a demonstration to show potential investors the first steps of the project (literally, the first steps of our robot!). Since Innovate my co-sponsor has collaborated on a funding proposal with a new company who they met at the event so, they found a new collaborator and, potentially, new funding.