KTH has long worked globally with a number of strategic partner universities and regions. In Asia, KTH has established strategic partnerships with universities Japan, China, India, Hong Kong, and Singapore.
KTH has been involved in strategic partnerships with universities globally for several years. Besides collaborations within various networks, KTH has a long-standing partnership with several universities in Asia, affecting research collaborations, joint programmes, seed funding, joint supervision, and student exchanges.
HKUST is one of the region's most outstanding universities. KTH and HKUST embrace the concept of strategic partnership with a selected number of key international players, where both KTH and HKUST are strategic partners of their choice. The partnership aims to boost joint publications, enhance collaborations among researchers, facilitate student exchange, and collaborate with society at large.
The partnership stretches back to 2014, and there have since been different research collaborations between both universities in mathematics, materials science, IT, and electronics. These collaborations have led to an increased number of co-publications of scientific articles. The partnership has also provided funding for joint research projects. KTH and HKUST have a large student exchange. Each year, KTH receives 18 students from HKUST who study a semester in Stockholm, and just as many KTH students can study a semester in Hong Kong.
KTH has a good network of contacts with Swedish companies active in Hong Kong, which also participate in developing city projects. Hong Kong's Smart City Program is an area in which KTH collaborates with the City of Hong Kong, Swedish companies and HKUST. Another collaboration exists with Hong Kong Science Park, which offers Swedish startups an attractive landing platform, where collaboration with HKUST provides access to its network of contacts.
Based in Chennai, IIT Madras has established itself as India's premier teaching, research and industrial consultancy centre. The collaboration between IIT Madras and KTH has a long history, with both Universities involved in Erasmus Mundus External Cooperation Window projects and research collaboration between individual faculties. Student mobility started in 2014, and the strategic partnership became active in 2019. Both institutes are also in the Heritage Network between prominent Indian and European Universities.
Like KTH, IIT Madras has advanced research facilities and researchers in most technology-related topics; hence, several research collaborations exist between the faculty. There is joint PhD supervision between research groups, which we expect to grow in the coming years. For example, the International Immersion Experience Scholarship invites three KTH doctoral students annually to jointly supervised research stays at IIT Madras.
The Erasmus+ International Credit Mobility programme with IIT Madras contributes to raising the quality of higher education and getting greater transparency between education programmes in different countries. The aim of the programme is also to increase competence and quality through internationalisation with selected partners. Staff mobility is available for both teaching and non-teaching staff. There are also student exchanges at the master's and doctoral levels.
NTU is one of the world's most prominent universities and an important partner for KTH. The partnership between the universities aims to create opportunities for undergraduate and doctoral students to move between the universities and to stimulate research collaborations in various subject areas.
KTH and NTU have a long history of student exchanges, which started in 2009. Annually, 40 students study for one or two semesters at each partner university.
Ranked as one of China's top universities, SJTU is an internationally renowned university in Shanghai that focuses on research. Initially, KTH and SJTU primarily established collaborations within biomedicine, medical technology, and healthcare technology, and these collaborations still have a strong presence in the strategic partnership that has been running since 2016.
The partnership has included several educational and research activities, such as student exchanges, joint programmes, joint research centres, and summer schools. KTH and SJTU have also collaborated with student recruitment, facilitating Chinese students' transition to studies at master's level at KTH.
KTH is a member of the Swedish Chamber of Commerce in China, which has extensive operations in Shanghai. Of all the overseas Swedish chambers of commerce, Shanghai has the highest number of registered companies.
The University of Tokyo is Japan's oldest and highest-ranking university, and KTH has a long-standing partnership with the university in general and their Graduate School of Engineering in particular. Japan is a major power in the world of research, accounting for approximately 15 per cent of the world’s research activities. As the largest recipient of Japan’s Ministry of Education’s funding for research within science and technology, the University of Tokyo holds a very central position within Japan’s university sector.
In conjunction with Karolinska Institutet and Stockholm University - the university alliance Stockholm Trio - KTH is a joint partner with the University of Tokyo.
The combined partnership with KTH, KI and SU constitutes one of the University of Tokyo's strategic partnerships, focusing on research collaborations, student and research exchanges, and faculty development. KTH invests in research visits in Tokyo to increase contacts for researchers and teachers at KTH with different research groups at the University of Tokyo. Each year, 10-14 students can study for one exchange semester at each university, making the University of Tokyo KTH's most significant partner for student exchanges in Japan.
KTH and the University of Tokyo also work together within the Deans' Forum university network, which includes ETH Zürich, Imperial College London, Cambridge University, UC Berkeley and MIT. The primary purpose of this network is to develop the engineering curriculum and industry collaboration.
March 2026: Symposium at KTH for the new Aspire-project on medical robotics and digital twins: Enhancing Machine Performance and Reliability through the Use of a Virtual Laboratory (EMPeR-VLab)
Researchers from the University of Tokyo, KTH and Karolinska Institutet gathered on March 12 for the Kick-off event for EMPeR-VLab with 46 participants.
HE Ambassador for Japan to Sweden Hideaki Mizukushi congratulated the initiators to the collaboration. Principal Investigator is Kanako Harada, Professor in UTokyo Graduate School of Medicine, Co-Investigator is Dr. Toru Kizaki, Lecturer in UTokyo Graduate School of Engineering, Overseas PI is Andreas Archenti, Professor in KTH Manufacturing and Metrology Systems dept. The project will strongly enhance the exchange of researchers between and strengthen joint research activities in the coming years.
The Aspire-projects are funded by the agency Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JST).
March 2026: Student visit to KTH
A group of seven students from the School of Engineering at UTokyo visited KTH on March 12-13. The students are master- and doctoral students in different departments. The group visited research labs, practiced English with KTH-students, attended the EMPeR-VLab symposium on medical robotics, practiced Pitching of innovation ideas in KTH Innovation Office with Internationalization Lead and business coach Viktor Olsson, and finally they visited the company Stockholm Exergi.
Professor Yasuyuki Yokono led the group.
November 2025: KTH Japan Day
The third KTH Japan Day took place on November 24 in the Architecure department. 200 people participated in the event. HE the Ambassador of Japan to Sweden Hideaki Mizukoshi joined the event again and had a discussion with KTH President Anders Söderholm on the importance and outlook for cooperation Sweden-Japan and especially with the expected accession of Japan to the Horizon Europe programme.
Several companies and organisations connected with Japan and active in Sweden contributed to the event; All Nippon Airways, Hitachi Energy, Mitsubishi, Mitsubishi Electric, Ovako, Senseair, Scibrea, Shimadzu, Japan Society for the Promotion of Science, Sweden-Japan Foundation, RIKEN Europe Office, JETRO Stockholm, Japan National Tourist Organization, and last but not least the Embassy of Japan.
Prof. Daniel Södergren and Dr. Yaerim Lee, researcher in UTokyo, told about their experiences of developing the
KTH-UTokyo Joint Lab
for biomaterials supported by the Aspire-project called EXAR. Prof. Andreas Archenti likewise talked about his coperation with Prof. Kanako Harada's lab in UTokyo on developing medical robotics and digital twins. Also this colaboration has been supported by the Aspire-funding from Japan.
October 2025: Presidents visit to Japan
KTH President Anders Söderholm visited University of Tokyo and other partner institutions in Japan during October 15-18. Söderholm visited different research environments in the School of Engineering and in Kashiwa Campus, and also had top-level meetings at Tohoku University, Keio University and RIKEN. The KTH group consisted of President Anders Söderholm, Vice President for International Relations Stefan Östlund, Professor Per Lundqvist, KTH lecturer in Japanese language Akiko Shirabe and Advisor for International Relations Torkel Werge.
September 2025: Workshop in University of Tokyo: Turning Vision into Action
The partners met in Hongo Campus for the 8th consecutive Workshop on Sept. 29-30.
The overarching theme this year was the accesion of Japan to the Horizon Europe programme. Research themes were 1) Brain, Ageing and Society, 2) Biomaterials, 3) Digital Twins - Technologies for Biomedical Applications and Precision Machines, 4) Urban Circularity in Action: Strategies for Decarbonising Cities, and 5) The UTokyo-LINK precision medicine and 3D genomics workshop. 19 students and staff from KTH participated on-site.
See UTokyo
website
for more information.
May 2025: Deans Forum - Language training in Japanese-English
KTH students enrolled in the advanced B1 Japanese course participated in the final activity on May 7. The assignment was to present their program specializations at KTH in Japanese, with support from University of Tokyo students through language tutoring. Guests at the event included Tomoya Takahashi, First Secretary at the Embassy of Japan; Kazuyuki Kuroda, Head of the Stockholm Office of the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS); Akihiro Kambara from Mitsubishi Electric; Mai Kanjo from JSPS; and Ms. Satsuki Shinohara from the Embassy of Japan. A number of KTH outgoing students and incoming exchange students also took part.
February 2025:Preparation Seminar for students and young researcher who are going to Japan
A preparation seminar was organised on February 10th. This yearly event is a collaboration between Karolinska institutet, KTH and Stockholm University. 80 people joined this year's event.
As a preparation for exchange studies or research visits the participants were given talks on intercultural communication, to hear from practical experiences from research visits in Japan, and got the opportunity to meet up with others who are also going to Japan. Contributions were made among others by Tomoya Takahashi, First secretary at the Embassy of Japan in Sweden, Jorunn Nilsson, department for didactics at Stockholm University, and Professor Per Nilsson, who is responsible for cooperation with Japan at Karolinska institutet.
November 2024:KTH Japan Day 2024
The second annual event, held on November 25, welcomed over 150 attendees. The program included the introduction of Japanese language MOOC materials developed by the University of Tokyo’s Faculty of Engineering, the announcement of visiting scholars joining UTokyo in 2025, and a speech of appreciation from JETRO London to a KTH exchange student who will study at UTokyo. Ambassador of Japan Mizukoshi delivered a speech.
November 2024: The Tandem Project within the Dean’s Forum continues as every semester as an English-Japanese language exchange. This time nine KTH-students from the Japanese A1.2 course cooperate for 5 weeks with students at UTokyo School of Engineering. Coordinators: Associate Professor Asako Uchibori (UT), Deans' Forum Administrator Miki Aizawa (UT).
October 2024: The hybrid Workshop Increasing knowledge for future society. Plenary at KI campus.
September 2024: Hands On Activity. A group of eight bachelor students from different areas at UTokyo accompanied by Professor Yumiko Furuichi was hosted at KTH over four days. The students sat in at a number of lectures, contributed to the Japanese language course and visited the company Atlas Copco.
June 2024: The symposium on Robotics in Biomedical Applications took place at KTH on June 17th. Coordinators: Professor Kanako Harada, Bioengineering Dept UTokyo, and Professor Andreas Archenti, Precision Engineering KTH
See the programme here
June 2024: Four researchers were nominated for research stays at UTokyo during 2024/2025.
September 2023: Workshop on Education for Sustainable Development. The Workshop with focus on learning for societal challenges took place on 28-29 September on SU Frescati campus with researchers, teachers and students from the four universities.
February 2023: 60 participants from Stockholm Trio, with 20 of them from KTH took part in the workshop Towards a Sustainable Future - The University and the Wider World on UTokyos main campus Hongo.
September 2020: On-line Workshop 2020 on Sustainable Development on 16th-18th of September. Day 1 involving all participants mainly dealt with how the current COVID-19 epidemic is affecting society, international activities and relationships. Day 2 devoted to research Themes.
October 2018: Workshop on Sustainability - A multidisciplinary collaboration for sustainable development. This workshop took place on UTokyo Hongo campus. Eight satellite workshops were performed focusing on different aspects of the sustainability problematic. Workshop on Sustainable Development 2018
September 2017: A workshop on the ageing population – Active Ageing – took place on September 20-22 on the campus of Karolinska Institutet. Close to 100 researchers from different disciplines were brought together in Stockholm for a truly multi-disciplinary approach. Responsible for the planning at KTH was Professor Erik Lindahl and International Relations Advisor Torkel Werge. Website for the Workshop on Active Ageing - Living longer and healthier in an ageing world
March 2017: Workshop in Tokyo to develop the exchange of researchers and students. Under the direction of Professor Peter Gudmundson, a group of eleven people will travel to Tokyo in order to identify common interests together with students and staff at the University of Tokyo with the aim of increasing exchanges between the educational institutions. The person responsible from KTH is lecturer Atsuto Maki.
July 2016: Lena Gumaelius – former Dean of the ECE school – visited the University of Tokyo for meetings on faculty development and for lectures on educational methods and gender equality policies.
June 2016: Seminar on the syllabus in Japanese for engineers with five members of the Deans’ Forum, including the University of Tokyo.
October 2015: KTH’s President Peter Gudmundson visited the University of Tokyo’s President Gonokami together with Professor Gustav Amberg and Torkel Werge of KTH’s Department for International Relations in order to discuss future forms of cooperation.
March 2015: Workshop at the University of Tokyo for faculty development. KTH was represented by lecturers Anna-Karin Högfeldt, Fredrik Lundell and Johan Fridell, together with Yoko Takau Drobin, who teaches Japanese and Japanese culture.
September 2014: Visit to KTH by 20 engineering students from the Masters' programmes at the University of Tokyo. The visit was coordinated by Yoko Takau Drobin, lecturer of Japanese and Japanese culture at KTH.
March 2014: Workshop at KTH in educational development
Professor Michael Handford from the School of Engineering led a group of young teachers in the discussion of educational methods with colleagues from KTH.
Per LundqvistAcademic contact for University of Tokyo
