The Federation of Thai Industries (FTI), through its Institute of Innovation for Industry (INNO), collaborates with Mahidol University to establish an industry-driven innovation platform under the Smart Agriculture Industry (SAI) initiative.

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This collaboration is designed as a real-world &ldquo;innovation sandbox,&rdquo; integrating academic research, industrial demand, and technology deployment within a unified ecosystem. Located at Mahidol University&rsquo;s Salaya campus, the platform leverages the university&rsquo;s research infrastructure and expertise, while FTI mobilizes industry networks, use cases, and commercialization pathways.

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Unlike traditional academic collaborations, this model emphasizes applied research, prototyping, testing, and demonstration, ensuring that innovations are validated and scalable for industrial adoption. The initiative uses high-value mushroom-based bioresources as a pilot case to develop end-to-end value chains&mdash;from upstream cultivation to downstream processing and market integration.

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FTI acts as an intermediary and system integrator, connecting industrial needs with academic capabilities, facilitating project development, and enabling translation of research into market-ready solutions. This collaboration represents a new model of industry&ndash;university co-development, contributing to Thailand&rsquo;s bioeconomy, food innovation, and industrial biotechnology sectors.

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This collaboration reflects FTI&rsquo;s evolving role as:

<ul>
	<li>A national platform for applied R&amp;D coordination</li>
	<li>An industry-facing research enabler</li>
	<li>A bridge between academia, industry, and funding ecosystems</li>
</ul>

Through initiatives such as SAI, FTI contributes to:

<ul>
	<li>Strengthening industry-driven research pipelines</li>
	<li>Increasing the utilization of research outputs in real sectors</li>
	<li>Enhancing Thailand&rsquo;s global research visibility and collaboration capacity</li>
</ul>