Florin Paun
Florin Paun, Ph.D., is an interdisciplinary scientist engineer, innovation catalyst, innovation director, investor and entrepreneur.
He encourages the comprehension of the human factors, origins of human nature and behaviors during the collaborative processes in order to build bridges between the world of practitioners and the world of scientists and economists in order to promote innovation and overcome cultural blockages. His aim is to bridge the gap between R&D and industry and lead technologies in an optimized innovation path to reshape the innovative approach in Europe. His strategies and tools aim to support the creation of the shared value between research laboratories, SMEs, multinationals and regions.
Innovation director, practitioner and theoretician of the evolutions of the innovation models and tools, Florin encourages the comprehension of the human factors and behaviors during the collaborative processes as innovation building thus bridges between the world of practitioners and the world of scientists and economists.
As an influential and lauded academic, Florin has stimulated innovation through a variety of projects including think tanks, start-ups, scientific models, books and other publications, international organisations, talks and lectures.
He is an advocate for continuous learning, efficiency and methodological reasoning and encourages these values in all his activities. As a lover of philosophy, Florin reminds us to re-evaluate the full length of Descartes’ iconic quote ‘”cogito ergo sum” and recognise that it is ‘’Dubito ergo cogito, cogito ergo sum’’ as a way to lead to critical thinking and engage the mind.
His book “J’innove, Donc Je Suis” (“I innovate so I exist”) embodies this spirit and the visionary thinking that leads to social and technological innovation. His other book, “Tout Entre-Preneurs!’’ (“All Entre-preneurs”), explores the evolution of innovation in the French scene with research gathered from SME’s to start-ups and encourages the relationship between the ‘’world of practitioners’ and the ‘’world of theoreticians’’. ‘’Innover ou périr’’ (“Innovate or disappear”) – another book authored by Florin – brings together the private and public sector to create a synergy and to highlight the importance of the advent of open – technological, social and business – innovation and the recovery of the business cycle.
Details
Educated at the Aerospace Faculty in Bucharest, where he got his Master in Aerospace Engineering Dr. Florin Paun has a also certificate “Sciences de l’Ingénieur” in the International Program at Ecole Polytechnique de Palaiseau, and a PhD. in Mechanical Engineering in Toulouse (ENSICA). He completed his education with a Master in Management and Leadership at MIT Sloan (United States).
Innovation director in aerospace sector in France, Florin started its career in the aerospace research being specialized in structures and was a strategy and development director at the Competitive Pole SAFE – PACA region. Florin was the Innovation Director of the Akka Group and previously the Development & Strategy Director of the New Competitiveness Cluster SAFE resulted after the merging of the Pegase and Risques, former Competitiveness Clusters in Aerospace respectively Management of Risk. He was in charge of identifying new opportunities of development and proposing the adapted strategy to tackle such opportunities and he is also launching the respective activities. First actions were performed in engaging SAFE on best practices related to open innovation in gathering together SMEs with large industrials and corporations.
Florin also was the Industrial Innovation Deputy Director at ONERA – France National Aerospace Research Centre, since January 2005, in charge with the Technology Transfer and International Business Development and defines programs and new partnership policies focusing on complementary knowledge, cross supporting offers, mutual intellectual property valuation, joint spin-off, risk sharing co-development. Previously, as Senior Science and Technology Expert, he coordinated the Multifunctional Materials program at ONERA and also gave courses for master degree in aerospace multifunctional materials.
As innovation leader, Florin is one of the 5 French experts and one of the 2 Romanian experts in the Pilot Jury of the European Council of Innovation.
He is expert-inventor of several tools and methods for collaborative innovation such as “Demand Readiness Level” (DRL(market pull tool) completing the TRL (NASA tech push tool), “Contract of shared risks and benefits”, “asymmetries identification and compensation in the highly collaborative process”.
Florin is member of the more international Innovation Networks for Research and Innovation (RRI, Technology Transfer Society, ONERA Alumni, MIT Alumni, etc.)
He published 3 books in innovation management and has been quoted in multiple international newspapers including: Aerospace Testing Magazine, Les Echos, l’Usine Nouvelle and Air & Cosmos.
His scientific work, based on more of 200 project he worked on, gained worldwide recognition and put in light the emergence of a new innovation French model but also completed the theories of two Nobel Prize Winners (Stiglitz, J., Sen. A) after having applied and adapted them to the highly collaborative processes like innovation.
Florin is teaching its own innovation methods in international schools for master degrees students and is senior advisor in innovation collaborative process of innovation and impact of human factors for governments, multinationals, networks of practitioners, European INTRA-PRENEURS, Innovation School of ANRT in Paris (ANRT Ecole de l`Innovation), ISAE, Ecole de l’Air, ENAC, ESEO, Toulouse Business School.
With his strategies and tools, he has more than 70 technology transfer agreements succeeded, creating shared value between research laboratories, SMEs, multinationals and regions.
He is the author of open innovation strategies including the contributions of more than 50 international business and political leaders in the last 10 years.
He is also an entrepreneur and business angel with extensive business development experience out of the aerospace domain, especially in emerging East-European markets. He had created his own Engineering and Development Company (Celidea), his own start-up on cross participative evaluation platform (XValuator.fr) and he is an associated founder of another dynamic start-up in France (Progonline.com). He is also a founding member of the think tank “Club de Bucarest”, the first Parisian think tank of independent professionals from Eastern Europe.
Florin’s years of experience in the technology, invention and engineering industry did not only make him a pioneer in various fields, it also led to him continuously seeking ways to facilitate and streamline the inventive and innovative process. This was one of the reasons he founded the ‘’Agilising Innovation’ group in the exclusive ‘DOer’s Community; where leading ENTREpreneurs and INTRApreneurs collaborate and propose new ground-breaking innovation strategies while also jointly creating more shared value with multiple stakeholders.
