Inspection and Maintenance (I&M) represents a huge economic activity (estimation of 450 Bn€ global market) spanning across different sectors such as energy, transport, civil engineering and water supply management. EU hosts over half of I&M robotics offer but there is a gap between the market needs and high potential applications.

RIMA (Robotics for Inspection and Maintenance) is a 4-year project aiming to bridge this gap by linking smaller service providers and tech companies with industry. Companies that get accepted to RIMA Open Call will be provided a variety of acceleration services such as equity-free funding for testing and technology transfer of robotics, training and education, business mentoring and connections with regional RIMA experts.

RIMA supports financially and technically 50 cross-border experiments involving European Small and Medium-sized enterprises through 2 Open Call rounds (2019 / 2020) with a total amount of 8.1M€. Successful candidates will receive equity-free funding for Technology transfer and development in I&M robotic applications.

RIMA network, supported by ICT Cluster Bulgaria and Institute of Mechanics, Bulgarian Academy of Science organize an information & matchmaking day on October, 4th, 2019 in Sofia Tech Park, Lab Complex Conference hall No 125. The event will give the opportunity participants to get information about the newest trends in Europe on the  use of robots for inspection and maintenance and the current funding opportunities for Technology Transfer Experiments (TTE) and Technology Demonstrators (TD)

The target group of the event are:
·       end users able to describe challenges in Inspection and Maintenance of Infrastructures in the sectors (oil and gas, nuclear, transport hubs, transport infrastructure, water supply and sanitation, energy production and distribution)
·       integrators, techno and service providers having some interest in robotics, Non-destructive testing,