Award of excellence given to ESAD Product Masters graduate Patricia Santos and Thesis supervisors, Jeremy Aston and Teresa Sarmento, for the best published article about — innovation and design — in the Tecnometal journal, supported by AIMMAP.

On October 8, 2024, Patricia Santos was honoured with the TecnoMetal Prize 2023 by Mr. Vitor Neves, President of AIMMAP (Associação Dos Industriais Metalúrgico, Metalomecânicos e Afins de Portugal), along with AIMMAP’s distinguished supporting members.

In 2020, Patricia Santos, then an ESAD Product Design Master’s student, completed her thesis on sustainable packaging for the Azorean food industry. Collaborating with Innovation Green Azores (IGA) researchers, Patricia proposed using Conteira, an invasive plant species in the Azores, to create eco-friendly packaging solutions for locally produced foods. This approach, driven by principles of circular economy, aimed to leverage local resources for transforming, customising, and integrating sustainable packaging to preserve and showcase Azorean products. Under the mentorship of her thesis supervisors, Jeremy Aston (Coordinator of the Product Design Master’s Program at ESAD) and Teresa Sarmento (Senior Investigator at CEIIA), Patricia’s work was later transformed into an article published in AIMMAP's Tecnometal journal (Issue No. 249) in summer 2020.

To commemorate Tecnometal journal’s 45th anniversary, AIMMAP’s President, Directors, and a selected jury evaluated numerous articles, this year focusing on the theme “Sustainability: Challenges and Opportunities for Industry.” Despite Patricia’s project not centring on metallic materials, its innovative approach to multidisciplinary collaboration and business opportunities for Portuguese industry conveyed an inspiring message on the importance of cross-industry partnerships for sustainable economic growth.