Our Network

Oulu University of Applied Sciences

The most attractive higher education school in Northern Finland

As an academic community of 10,000 people, Oulu University of Applied Sciences is a major regional player. 73% of students come from Northern Ostrobothnia. Almost 80% stay in work in our area. Employment rate of graduates is 72 %. Our projects involve about 450 companies and organizations per year.

OUAS offers education in bachelor's degree and a master's degree level, open university education, specialization, and continuing education for professionals. The fields of study at OUAS are information technology, media and performing arts, business, natural resources, health and social care, engineering and professional teacher education.

Internationality is part of the quality of education and it gives variety of opportunities for our students. We develop new professional skills in cooperation with national and international educational and research communities.

In addition to teaching, our other important tasks are in research, development, and innovation work. We support the development of the Oulu region and the whole Northern Finland. We train skilled professionals, support business in our region, develop innovation activities and increase international interaction. OUAS carries out socially important research, development, and innovation work by creating new innovations and know-how. The focus areas are environmental wisdom, sustainable well-being, and digital reform.

 

University of Oulu

The University of Oulu is an international science university which creates innovation for the future, well-being, and knowledge through research and education. University of Oulu is one of the biggest and the most multidisciplinary universities in Finland. The university consists of eight faculties and many specialized research units, covering fields from humanities and medicine to business, science and technology. The Faculty of Medicine, FoM, an integral part of the Kontinkangas Life Sciences Campus, is situated next to the University Hospital of Oulu. The campus is a unique combination of partners in research, education, health services and business. The faculty provides versatile education in the field of health sciences and has an important role in creating modern, high-quality medical and healthcare services in northern Finland.

Center for Health and Technology (CHT), which is located at Faculty of Medicine, is innovating digital health solutions together with researchers, entrepreneurs, and healthcare providers. Since 2011, CHT has been systematically creating synergies for OuluHealth ecosystem stakeholders by facilitating research, development and innovation (RDI) collaboration. It leads OuluHealth spearhead program (2021–2027) called "Data solutions in preventive and supportive healthcare” and builds up new partnerships to highlight trends, gaps in policies, and best practices for the creation of person-centric data driven health in Europe. CHT is building Digital Health Knowledge Partnerships and collaboration models in data intensive research and innovation. The aim is to promote the potential of health data exploitation and to create capabilities for turning data into business in proactive healthcare. By strengthening and creating knowledge and growth to speed up knowledge building in digital health, including enabling technologies like AI, data analytics, and machine learning, CHT secures Oulu Region as a digital health innovation hub (DigiHealth Hub), an attractive partner and place of investment in RDI network cooperation.

 

Luleå University of Technology

Luleå University of Technology research is conducted in close collaboration with industries and leading international universities. We have the highest proportion of corporate funded research among Swedish universities, unique experimental environments for research, and technical excellence combined with multidisciplinary research. From the university the Department of Health, Education and Technology, Department of Systems and Space Technology and the Innovation Office participate in the project.

Department of Health, Education and Technology, HLT have nine research subjects in health and learning. Participating research subjects in the project are Nursing, Occupational therapy, and Physiotherapy. The department houses exciting and cross-border research in health and learning as well as research with a technical focus. There are also laboratory environments with artificial intelligence, robotics and sensors. A number of research and development projects are also underway in collaboration with municipalities and Region Norrbotten. The department has two graduate schools with different specializations, The Graduate School Practice-based Educational Research (PROFS) and the Academy of Health of the Future. Both offer a cohesive doctoral education environment for admitted doctoral students.

The research subject Information Systems is located at the Department of Systems and Space Technology at Luleå University of Technology. Information systems is a design and innovation-oriented subject that focuses on, among other things, digital service innovation. We have long and solid experience of research and development in areas such as participatory design, user-centered service innovation and user engagement as well as processes and environments, such as Living Labs, which support user-centered digital innovations. From 2000, we have run Botnia Living Lab, which has developed from being a test bed to becoming a reality-based living lab. Botnia is a world-leading environment for user-centered research, development and innovation, supported by innovative methods, tools and experts, and Botnia also co-founded the European Network of Living Labs ENoLL (www.enoll.org).

The role of the Innovation Office is to support, educate, and coordinate in areas that deal with commercialization, collaboration and innovation at the university. The office hosts the regional hub for the Forum for Social Innovation in Sweden and works with a focus on developing knowledge and meeting places for social innovation and is in line with the Government's strategy for social business and social innovation in Sweden. It is a neutral platform for knowledge about social innovation that builds capacity within and between academia, private, public and non-profit sectors as well as among citizens / people who face societal challenges in new ways.

 

Kalix Kommun

Kalix municipality is located in the north of Sweden, which is further located within the province of Norrbotten and has just over 16 000 inhabitants. The social administration has activities that provide care and support, support and assistance to people who are in need, especially housing, home care, personal assistance and individual and family care.

The social administration's areas of responsibility include individual and family care, health and medical care and care for the elderly and disabled. Social administration means working for good care in development and good sustainable relationships. Kalix municipality is, among other things, at the forefront of new working methods, modern welfare technology and e-health to increase quality, strengthen the individual's participation, security, safety and independence. In the social administration, the work environment is an important issue, and our ambition is to give all employees the conditions to do as good a job as possible.

The social administration is a workplace for about 700 employees. The support offered by the social services contributes to us, young and old, being able to live and work in our home environment and receive an individual treatment based on life situation.

 

Social Administration, Luleå Municipality 

Luleå Municipality is the second largest employer in Norrbotten with nearly 6,500 employees. The Municipality stands for a large part of the community service to citizens and companies. The Social administration is one of the largest municipal administrations and promotes the citizens economic and social security, equality in living conditions and active participation in community life.

The social administration contains a wide range of functions and many different professions that are responsible for information, advice, support, service, care and nursing, financial assistance and other assistance to individuals and families. The Social Department is also responsible for health care in special forms of housing, in day care and for homecare services.

By participating in this project, the social administration wants to establish networks for development and exchange of experience with other parties for future collaboration, as well as contribute with our own knowledge from different areas within the municipality. Municipality of Luleå works closely with research and innovation to find new solutions but also to work evidence based. The Social Department participates in different research applications / projects.