The industrial collaborations of the MTG take place in many different ways and contexts but the most common collaborations involve custom projects, industrial PhDs, or the industrial training program that we have as part of the SMC Master. The MTG offers a technology portfolio that is being exploited by many companies.  

Custom projects

The MTG is experienced in carrying out R&D projects in collaboration with companies. In these projects, we either develop specific technologies or adapt MTG technologies to the needs of the company. All these projects involve a strong and fruitful collaboration between MTG researchers and the company. A common type of project is put together when a company wants to use one of our technologies and needs some support in order to adapt it to their particular application needs. In the last few years, we have collaborated very successfully with companies from a large variety of sectors.

Industrial PhDs

Research collaborations with companies can be done through Industrial PhDs. This is a type of PhD in which the student carries their research jointly supervised by a university professor and an engineer from a company. There is some funding from public institutions to partially support industrial PhDs. The MTG has been involved in a number of successful industrial PhDs in collaboration with our partner companies, some partially funded by the Catalan Government. These industrial doctorates act as a bridge for knowledge transfer and encourage closer ties between industry and research.

Industrial Training Program

This program offers the opportunity for companies to shape the education of our master students by incorporating their technological needs in the work to be done by them.

Every year, after a very competitive selection process, 20 new students enroll in the Master in Sound and Music Computing. The selection takes into account the academic background of the candidates and their potential to become successful professionals in the music technology field. The most clear measure of our achievement is that most of our alumni have profited from their MTG experience to develop successful careers in our field.  

The students of the SMC Master come from all over the world and spend 1 or 2 years with us learning about the state of the art methodologies of relevance in the analysis, description, synthesis, transformation, and production of sound and music signals. The main component of their education is their thesis, a research project in which they work from the very beginning and in which they apply what they learn. This project offers the unique opportunity to work on problems of interest to companies, thus being able to train our students with the specific technical skills needed by our collaborating companies.   

A typical industrial training program lasts the whole 9 months of the academic year (from October to June), during which a student takes courses and in parallel carries out the proposed project under the joint supervision of the MTG and the company. The steps for defining and carrying out a joint project are:

1. The company and the MTG agree on a set of possible topics and on the project conditions (calendar, IP, supervisors, …).
2. The MTG does a pre-selection of candidates among the current Master students and the company makes the final choice.

3. The project is carried out following the academic calendar of the Master. Once the academic year ends, the student can do an internship in the company.

The most direct benefit for a company participating in this program is having access to a pool of great students and being involved in focusing their training on the topics of interest to the company. These well-trained students are ideal candidates for being hired by the company once they finish the Master's program. Another clear benefit for the company is the possibility to explore a research idea in collaboration with the MTG, being able to exploit the results obtained once the project ends.

The MTG is very interested and open to collaborating with industrial companies, exploring opportunities for mutual benefit. Please contact us for any further information.