Åpning av Tsinghua Centre for Innovation and Entrepreneurship

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Dean Zhu Dequan, President Henjesand,

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Thank you for the invitation to speak here at this event.

It is a great pleasure being here visiting the beautiful surroundings where President Xi himself was once a student.

As the former Norwegian Minister of Education, I have seen a number of universities [all over the world]. Tsinghua is definitely one of the most beautiful university campuses I have ever visited.

However, I am not here to talk about the beautiful surroundings.  I am here to talk about why China is an important market for Norwegian industry and business. Furthermore, I am here to welcome the cooperation between Tsinghua University and the Norwegian Business School BI.

BI has been present in China for more than 20 years. The newly established cooperation between BI and Tsinghua University is fruitful in many ways.  Firstly, for academic reasons as Tsinghua University is ranked one of the top academic institutions in China, Asia and worldwide.

However also because Tsinghua holds an important position in the innovation "ecosystem" in China. A cooperation agreement between Tsinghua and BI was signed during the Norwegian Prime Minster Erna Solberg's official visit to China in April 2017.  

Since then and thanks to hard work and determination from both institutions, we can see today the result of this agreement when the Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship becomes a reality. This collaboration secures mutually beneficial technology and knowledge cooperation between Norway and China. Further, this could help small technology companies scale up and achieve commercial success.

Speaking of success, I am pleased that we later will witness the signing of an agreement between Yield Capital and the Norwegian tech-company Prediktor Instruments. I hope to see positive results for both parties.

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One of the main messages during our visit to China this time is that the cooperation between our countries has moved to another level. Previously, Norway used to sell raw materials and buy cheap consumer goods. Today, Norwegian and Chinese companies are also partners in technology development and knowledge exchange.

Norway is one of the countries with the highest degree of digitisation in the world.  The rapid development concerning the future 5G mobile network, Internet of things and artificial intelligence changes the prerequisites for value creation in all industries. It also creates new solutions that can contribute to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals, like for instance in health-tech and green technology.

Norway has world-leading knowledge and technology communities that are drivers for this development. So does China. This is a good starting point for a closer and stronger cooperation. The cooperation between Tsinghua and BI on innovation and entrepreneurship is at the very core of this. I am positive that it will encourage a closer interaction between competent Norwegian and Chinese capital investment companies and high-tech companies.

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On a closing note, I would again like to congratulate you all on the opening of the Centre for Innovation and Entrepreneurship. I wish you and all the scale-up companies in the program fruitful results and I hope we will see a strengthened cooperation between Norway and China in the field of hi-tech and innovation.

Thank you for your attention.