The EXPERTISSUES EEIG is going to be headquartered, during the next four years, at the 3B´s Research Group facility. The group is installed in a 4 floor building located in AvePark (a Technological Park connected with U. Minho and the City Council of Guimarães, Portugal), featuring a total gross area of 3600m2, which became fully operational in July 2008. This facility is designed for develop world-class research in the field of Tissue Engineering and Regenerative medicine, and aims to work as a hub for the integration of the research developed by different branches of the Institute. The top floor will host Stemmatters, a spinoff of the 3B’s Research Group, while the other three floors will host labs for conducting research ranging from materials synthesis and processing, to animal testing. This building allows for the conduction of complex experimental programs under very competitive conditions in close collaboration with the several Members’ branches across Europe. This fact will allow the Institute to integrate a diverse set of competences and resources that would be otherwise fragmented, which include the expertise, human resources, equipment, and laboratories of the Members in order to carry out a set of technical and scientific activities. This facility is prepared to host 150 researchers.

MarketPlace (Databases)
To help create and sustain a working environment conducive to doing and supporting collaborative research, the EEIG MarketPlace will be used as a platform for sharing resources, standardizing processes and procedures, and offering services. The EXPERTISSUES EEIG MarketPlace will offer to the EEIG members and scientific community outside the EEIG, services on consultation to find information, resources, equipments and expertise. This will constitute an important commercial basis for the EXPERTISSUES EEIG to support the implementation of ambitious multidisciplinary research and development programs in the field of Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine. There are many compelling reasons for developing this service on a commercial basis. EEIG will identify and establish a network of contacts of potential users of this service, and will conduct advertisement activities (e.g. marketing through a webpage) to disseminate the existence of EEIG MarketPlace and that it is available for commercial access.

In an initial approach, the EEIG will use the existing MarketPlace for the EXPERTISSUES NoE. However, the EXPERTISSUES EEIG MarketPlace will be continuously updated and adjusted to EEIG needs by the member responsible for the Database. The MarketPlace will be composed by the following databases:

• Raw materials
• Scaffold materials
• Growth factors
• Cells
• Bioreactors
• In vivo models