The first edition of DroneDays is soon approaching, so the organizers of the event, Ivana Mikolić, Stjepan Bogdan, Matko Orsag and Frano Petric (LARICS and UNIZG-FER team members) told us more about what visitors can expect at the workshop. The interview was published on the DroneDays website and you can read it in the detailed news content. Registrations for the event are now open - register by following this link . DroneDays is a two-day workshop focused on unmanned aerial vehicles which will be held on 26th and 27th March 2019 at UNIZG-FER in Zagreb, Croatia . The programme consists of keynote lectures, an exhibition area, as well as a flying zone, and is focused on unmanned aerial vehicle applications and end-user industries. It will serve as a meeting place for experts from the industry and academia, end-users, as well as regulatory bodies from the region.

On December 29, LARICS and AeRoTwin team members Matko Orsag and Frano Petric took one of the Laboratory's NAO robots to the Advent in Maksimir, where they participated in an art workshop titled "Overcoming the barriers of autism - together" , organized by the Autism Association Zagreb . During the workshop, visitors had the opportunity to meet members of the Association, learn about their activities and take a look at the crafts they exhibited, as well as to get to know the NAO robot and learn about its role in diagnosing autism. Read some more about the event here (in Croatian) and take a look at some of the Association's photos here . This activity was in part sponsored by the AeRoTwin project.

On Wednesday, 19th December, the LARICS team held a fund-raising event for the Autism Association Zagreb , where the robots from their Laboratory worked together to serve visitors with chocolate waffles, brownies and tea or mulled wine. This innovative event was visited by over 2000 people and some 700 orders were taken and served, which resulted in a wonderful amount of over 13 thousand kuna (almost €2000) in donations, all of which will be given to the Autism Association Zagreb.

As part of the AeRoTwin project, the first edition of DroneDays, a two-day workshop focused on unmanned aerial vehicles and their end-users, will be held in Zagreb at UNIZG-FER on 26th and 27th March 2019 . The programme of the event will consist of keynote lectures, an exhibition area and a flying zone, and the event will serve as a meeting place for experts from the fields of industry and academia, end-users, as well as regulatory bodies from the region. All end-users, aerial vehicle operators, members of academia and the industry, particularly from the local region, are invited to save the date for the first edition of DroneDays, as there is a lot in store for the event. For more up-to-date information, please visit the official DroneDays website .

The AeRoTwin project will be presented at the "Spreading Excellence and Widening Participation. Pasado, Presente y Futuro" event organized by the Spanish Ministry of Science with the participation of the European Commission. The event will be held on 10 December 2018 in Seville and project team member Silvia de los Santos from CTA will present the audience and general public with AeRoTwin as an example of a successful project proposal and implementation .

From the 5th to the 7th of December, 2018, the project's first Innovation Management Training will be held in Zagreb, Croatia, at UNIZG-FER, hosted by LARICS. The title of the event is " EU and Business R&D Project Management ", and the goal of the three-day training is for the attendees to gain a better understanding of EU projects, proposals and calls, as well as the tools used to manage them, with special focus on Horizon 2020 projects. The training will be led by four speakers: Vesna Torbarina from the Croatian Chamber of Economy , Manuel Jiménez Díaz from the Morera&Vallejo Group , Silvia de los Santos from the Technological Corporation of Andalusia and Matko Barišić from ABB AS Norway. The full agenda can be found at this link .

During the week from the 19th to the 23rd of November, 2018, the AeRoTwin Project Coordinator Yiannis Vacondios was in Zagreb for a study visit organized by the European Commission to learn more about Croatian ministries and institutions, and to explore the impact joining the European Union has so far had on Croatia. Three LARICS team members used this chance to meet with him for lunch on Friday, 23rd November, and discuss current ideas and plans for the project, as well as what is in store for the future of the project.

For this year's European Robotics Week, LARICS participated in two events in Zagreb - the University of Zagreb Fair (22nd to 24th November) and University of Zagreb Faculty of Electrical Engineering Open Day (24th November) with the brand robotics@fer.hr and together with two more robotics laboratories from the faculty - LABUST and LAMOR . Both the events were very successful!