Meeting the needs of businesses and offering innovative solutions is possible with the InnovAM (Innovate with Arts et Métiers) and MayAM Time to Concept challenges organized by the Arts et Métiers campusin Angers andthe Laval institute. This is an opportunity for businesses to benefit from an outside perspective and launch new projects.
Challenges in the service of businesses
The principle behind these challenges: 75second-yearstudents from the Grande Ecole Program, divided into four teams of 15-20 students, and 25 students from the MTI3D research-oriented National Master's Degree program at the Arts et Métiers Institute Arts et Métiers Laval have one week to come up with solutions for partner companies, supervised by teachers, teacher-researchers, and experts.
The engineering students propose projects that address real issues encountered by companies, on technical or organizational themes. As for the MTI3D Master's students, they submitted innovative, turnkey concepts for products, processes, and services related to immersive technologies.
The objectives: to enable companies to benefit from new opportunities through creative and technical solutions, to strengthen links between academia and industry, to introduce students to the challenges and demands of the business world by working on concrete projects, and to apply the skills acquired in class.
Diverse themes and varied partners
While students pursuing a research-oriented national master's degree are given a blank slate to give free rein to their creativity, engineering students are given more specific specifications by companies.
- ForAlter, the public body responsible for land use planning, the objective was to carry out and model a study for the development and restructuring of the center of Pruillé.
- Manitou, a manufacturer of material handling equipment, wanted to benefit from the students' outside perspective to improve the integration of cables and hoses on a machine.
- Schneider Jaquet, a designer and manufacturer of special-purpose machinery, needed to optimize and improve the performance of a workshop that refurbishes milling equipment.
- Finally, forChereau, a manufacturer of refrigerated truck bodies, students were asked to propose a solution for recycling scrap material.
Four other partners,GYS - Welding, Charging & Collision Repair Equipment,Selha Group,Guillemot Corporation,andLaval Hospital, benefited from creative solutions to innovate with immersive technologies!
Challenges approved by companies
Feedback from businesses has been very positive, as evidenced by Claude Guerin, deputy mayor of La Membrolle/Longuenée, who says he is impressed by the work that has been done in such a short time, with a variety of high-quality proposals that address their local concerns.
This type of partnership is important in enabling students to work on real-world projects and also in helping us to guide our choices. Congratulations to the students and teachers who, with an attentive ear and an outside perspective, have produced this remarkable work. The ball is now in our court to select the most relevant project!
For Arthur Monti, Research & Development Engineer at Chereau, "Benefiting from an outside perspective and solutions generated through brainstorming by putting several groups of students in 'competition' with each other is a great initiative. An internal debriefing will allow us to select those that will eventually be tested or adopted. This challenge is also an opportunity to raise awareness for the recruitment of interns or future engineers!"
Philippe Guyomard, partner at Schneider Jaquet, is pleasantly surprised by the amount of work done by the students and believes he can use the proposed projects to analyze the internal situation and move forward with their needs.
Finally, Olivier Gohier from Laval Hospital said he had a wonderful experience. "We would like to once again express our sincere gratitude to the students, who listened carefully to our needs and proposed a range of solutions that fully met our expectations. It is admirable to see the quality of their work in such a short period of time. They were able to highlight what we were trying to build, and we are now a little closer to defining this project."
Students delighted to experience the reality of the field
For the students, too, the outlook is positive! Alexis André, an engineering student who worked on the Schneider Jaquet project, believes that"Beyond the technical aspect, this challenge allows you to confront the human side and the reality of the business world. Even though the work was done remotely, we had regular meetings with the teacher and the company tutor, so there was real interaction! It's quite a challenge to discover, study, and propose solutions to a company in just one week. Schneider Jaquet had real expectations, which made the challenge very motivating because we knew that the company would listen to our proposals. It was a great experience!"
We were able to put our engineering skills to use within an organization while developing our personal culture.
Xavier Pichon de Bury, meanwhile, was delighted to have been able to meet with the mayor of La Meignane, municipal officials, and the company ALTER on the first day of the challenge to learn about the project's challenges firsthand. "The aim was to enhance the value of municipal land in order to find solutions that would be more beneficial to residents. This unique project, which is less technical and more focused on the urban landscape, has enabled us to discover a new vocabulary and understand the practical issues involved in land use planning."
These challenges, labeled"French Fab Challenge,"arepowerful levers that enable companies to call on motivated students who put their skills to work on concrete projects and benefit from faculty support. This is an opportunity for companies to launch new projects. Some then rely on LAMPA, theArts et Métiers research laboratoryArts et Métiers Angers campus, and AMValor to bring them to fruition.
