VLF4eu project at the international YML meeting
On 14th November 2025 our representatives Unai Muniain and Irati Salcedo took part as speakers in the annual Young Manufacturing Leaders (YML) international event, held in Milan, Italy. They contributed to two roundtables: Irati on "Young Manufacturing Leaders City-Hubs Network: Origin, Journey, and Achievements" and Unai on "Panel II: Young Manufacturing Leaders City-Hubs Flagship Projects".
During the Keynote I, Irati, as YMLBCH member and Process and Products' Innovation Dual Engineering student, offered a valuable student perspective. She reflected on what she expects from the YML initiative, highlighting the importance of giving voice to young learners within international industry-driven platforms like this one.
During the Keynote II, Unai introduced the VLF4EU project, sharing the potential of the Virtual Learning Factory concept — a model that integrates factory environments into educational settings such as VET, universities, and lifelong learning. He explained how virtualizing learning factories increases accessibility, making it possible to train without relying solely on physical machines, or to allow multiple users to interact simultaneously.
He also addressed a key topic raised at the World Manufacturing Forum: the importance of identifying which skills students need during their learning journey. In VLF4EU, we aim to analyse skill gaps across countries and develop targeted virtual learning environments to address them.
Unai emphasized that both learning centres and industry are the main beneficiaries of this project. While education institutions will adopt these virtual factories in teaching, companies can use them for upskilling and reskilling their workforce, contributing directly to closing the industry’s skill gaps.
The success of the project relies on collaboration: educational centres, SMEs, and industrial associations from several European countries are working together to shape the future of Industry 5.0 learning.
We’re proud to be part of this transformation!
Thank you so much to World Manufacturing Foundation and YML Network for inviting us to this annual strategic event, and for giving us the opportunity to join again the YML hub's community and present one of our outstanding projects.
