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17/06/2015 Press release

Total – Main Sponsor of Innovation Day at QU

“It is vital to present innovation to the youth and have them involved at university level” says Yousef Al-Jaber, Head of CSR.

Total seized the opportunity to sponsor and support Center for Entrepreneurship (CFE) at Qatar University (QU) in their recent ‘Innovation Day’ event.

The event was aimed to stimulate the students’ minds with sparks of innovation in Qatar and around the globe. This unique event was dedicated toward presenting cutting edge technologies that are taking place here in Qatar. Total sponsorship marked the support of Total to promote innovation in today’s economy and society with special presentation of Total Research and innovation activities dedicated to Qatar oil and gas sector.

Over 50 students and faculty members of Qatar University (QU) gathered in their premises to exchange ideas on awareness for this initiative.

Prof. Nitham Hindi, Dean of College of Business and Economics at Qatar University gave the opening speech of the event, addressing the importance of innovation to develop a knowledge based economy. QU thus contributes to economic development, an important objective of Qatar National Development Strategy 2011-2016.

Dr. Philippe Julien, Director of Total Research Centre Qatar (TRC-Q) gave a keynote speech to the audience in which he explained the vital role innovation plays in the energy industry to prepare for the future. “New technologies are needed to produce more barrels of oil and gas and to provide solutions to our technical and environmental challenges. Innovation does not only come from our expertise. Once we have defined our specific needs, innovation often comes from solutions derived in other scientific and technical domains, such as robotics, nanotechnologies, biotechnologies, medical imaging or even the space industry!”

Yousef Al-Jaber, Total’s Head of CSR and Institutional Relations also launched an innovative contest for the students which called upon them to solve a case using their creativity, critical thinking and problem solving skills. “We believe it is vital to present innovation to the youth and get them involved at university level. At universities there exist the necessary infrastructure to nurture and encourage innovation among the leaders of the future”, said Yousef.

On the other hand, Dr. Mahmoud Abdellatif, Director of Centre for Entrepreneurship, the main body at Qatar University organizing this event said: “the Center is committed to supporting innovation and entrepreneurship activities and promoting such a culture among students. In this respect, we organize many activities and events for promoting innovation, one of them being a contest in October 2014 attended by 102 QU students, and a start-up weekend with ICTQatar having 45 participants. I would like to acknowledge the role of Total for the success of the QU Innovation day event through their sponsorship and for delivering the main lecture.”

Innovation plays a key role in the success of oil and gas companies such as Total. TRC-Qatar is one of the 7 centers where Total EP has set up a state of the art research and development facility.