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RESEARCH AND TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPMENT IN SARDINIA
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ICTs in Sardinia

Girl in front of computer monitors
Technology innovation and research are at the centre of the Region of Sardinia’s development strategy. Regional policy mainly targets the promotion of cutting-edge science and technology areas, marked by the presence of well-established highly advanced local expertise, first and foremost in the ICT area.

The Sardinian experience in this field has been ahead of the times in Italy:

- the greatest stimulus was provided by CRS4, the research centre which, under the leadership of Nobel Laureate Carlo Rubbia and prof. Paolo Zanella, in the early 1990s created the first Italian website and search engine and placed on the Internet L'Unione Sarda, the first online newspaper in Italy

- another key contribution came from the pioneering initiatives of Video On Line and later Tiscali, currently one of the main European Internet Service Providers and the first Italian company to offer VoIP services, which laid the foundations for development of the sector

- the presence of the Science and Technology Park of Sardinia, one of whose main areas of specialisation is ICT, has favoured, along the years, the creation of new high-tech enterprises and the development of specialised human resources

- the island has an efficient research system and highly qualified human capital, thanks to the presence of degree and PhD courses in computer science.

One of the aims of Regional programming for the period 2007-2013 is to continue supporting the spread of ICTs in both households and enterprises, and develop public and private ICT products and services, through balanced support to supply and demand and a greater volume of investments in human capital.

In particular, a key strength of the Framework Programme Agreement on the Information Society launched by the Regional Government is the implementation of the Region IT network. The network, included by reason of its efficiency and innovation in the database of good practices in Italian public administration, is now in the advanced implementation stage, and relies on more than 1,100 km of fiberoptic cabling, covering the whole regional territory.

As concerns research and innovation, the current regional strategy has already carried out actions with the following aims:

- implement scientific research programmes and projects
- train highly specialised human resources, promoting their access to the enterprise system
- create competence centres and technology labs for the transfer of technical knowledge and research output to production processes and products, also by strengthening the Regional Technology Park
- promote the creation of Sardegna DistrICT, the Sardinian ICT district
- design and implement integrated tools for the creation of new high-tech enterprises
- set up services linking innovation demand and offer
- design and offer incentive tools to encourage enterprises to adopt new technologies.