Yesterday’s roundtable for members of Composites United Switzerland discussed the impact of the corona crisis on the composites industry. The 21 participants discussed, among other things, the difficulties that the lockdown will cause for innovation projects. Many universities and research institutes are closed. Nevertheless, it is still possible to use the laboratories at the University of Applied Sciences Rapperswil or at ZHAW. Also some other universities still keep their laboratories open but the number of people working in the laboratories is limited. An urgent question was how Innosuisse positions itself in the current difficult situation. Leendert den Haan, innovation mentor, gave the all-clear; operations continue as usual and new projects are gladly accepted. Now everyone has time to collect ideas for new projects and to submit them. CU Switzerland is happy to accept such ideas and helps to find the right project partners.

Stève Mérillat also presented planned online activities in the near future. For example, a webinar series will start on 16 April, which is free of charge. As a replacement for the cancelled “Sustainability” conference, there will be a conference week from 4 to 8 May. Each day there will be two presentations, which together will last a maximum of one hour.

At the end of yesterday’s discussion, the participants were asked about a continuation of such a discussion round. All agreed that this opportunity for exchange is important and should take place approximately every two weeks in the future.