Monday, June 16, 2008, Hotel Golf Jupiter 2, 14:00 - 15:30 

Co-chairs:
Milan Pagon, Professor & Dean
Faculty of Organizational Sciences, University of Maribor, Slovenia
Henk G. Sol, Professor of Business and ICT & Dean
Faculty of Economics and Business, University of Groningen, The Netherlands

Panelists:
Jukka Heikkilä, Professor & Dean
Faculty of Information Technology, University of Jyväskylä, Finland
Bernhard R. Katzy, Professor & Director
University BW München & CeTIM - Center for Technology and Innovation Management, Germany
& University of Leiden, The Netherlands
Wolf Rauch, Professor & Dean
Institute for Information Science and Business Informatics
Karl-Franzens-University Graz, Austria
Seija Kulkki, Director
Center for Knowledge and Innovation Research (CKIR), Helsinki School of Economics, Finland
& Partner, Finnish ICT SHOK - Strategic Competence Center

Panel outline

As border controls are disappearing from the face of Europe, the borders themselves remain. Not only as a geographical and political phenomenon, but more so as a psychological barrier in our heads. Mental models that we developed over the years do not get replaced that easily.  Information and communication technologies can play an important role in bridging the ‘gaps’ between the countries and between the regions. Serving as the means for crossing the borders (both real and those in our heads), they can eventually change our mental models. Cross-border collaboration can greatly improve and enhance our problem-solving abilities. While various agencies operate strictly within the borders of their jurisdiction, the problems they are dealing with frequently ignore those borders. Crime disregards all borders; so do natural disasters, diseases, infected birds and other animals, just to name a few. Working together, sharing know-how and information, exchanging data, etc., is the only true path toward managing those problems. The list of topics amenable to cross-border collaboration is very long, expanding to the areas of business and commerce, health, education, research, agriculture, energy, etc. Recent developments have added an “e” to this cross-border collaboration, so nowadays we are talking about cross-border e-collaboration or eRegion collaboration. Because this is a very proliferate area, there are still many issues to be explored, and a lot of questions to be asked and eventually answered. This is why the role of universities is so crucial in this development. While the universities themselves cannot provide all the answers (nor ask all the relevant questions), they should be at the forefront of shaping and fostering various modes of this collaboration.
 
The panel should, among others, address the following questions:

• In studying the cross-border eRegion collaboration, how can we reconcile the rigor and the relevance?
• What are the new emerging methodologies that can be used in developing and testing cross-border eRegion collaboration (such as Living-Labs)?
• How can we enhance cross-border eRegion collaboration in higher education?
• How can we make the research into the cross-border eRegion collaboration truly interdisciplinary?
• How can we increase the research into e-collaboration-related topics (such as virtual teams)?
• How to involve professors, students, businesses, government agencies, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), communities, etc. in cross-border eRegion collaboration research and implementation, and how to reconcile their different interests?