1. Joint Venture Prograamme at Cranfield (UK)

The Joint Venture Programme, newly launched by the Cranfield School of Management, offers help to companies that are looking to expand their business in developing countries. It is claimed that valuable European Community (EU) grants are being lost, and the Cranfield initiative offers a fast track through what they describe as the bureaucracy involved in making applications for aid to develop partnerships abroad. This is particularly true of companies involved with automation and robotics who because of their intense development and marketing activities fail to take advantage not only of EU programmes that offer financial assistance, but even the help that is at hand from their own government's initiatives.