Massimo Panarotto arrived at BTH as new PhD candidate

Massimo Panarotto has joined BTH and is becoming a PhD candidate with Professor Tobias C. Larsson to do research within sustainable product-service system innovation. He will start working modelling and simulation of value innovation and sustainability in the SAAB SåNätt project.

Here’s a brief interview with Massimo.

Massimo Panarotto | MSc | BTH

Massimo Panarotto | MSc | BTH

What is your academic background?
I earned my Master degree in Mechanical Engineering in 2011 at University of Padova, in Italy. Before, I earned my bachelor degree in 2007 and then I started my Master course in “Technology and Production”, a specialization that combines both Engineering aspects and Management aspect, such as Lean Production, Supply chain Management, Management of Innovation processes.

What is your previous experience?
My most important experience has doubtless been to be part of the Erasmus program 2010/2011. I have been an exchange student with the Luleå University of Technology, in Sweden. More in detail, I developed my Master Thesis on “Creative Methods for Sustainability Driven Innovation” with my supervisor Assistant Professor Peter Törlind within the division of Functional Product Development directed by Professor Tobias Larsson.

Improving my English, meeting new people (both exchange students and researchers) with different backgrounds and experiences, working in a multicultural environment like FPD really gave me the opportunity to feel as an “European Citizen” rather than an “Italian Citizen”, that I think is one of the mail goal of the Erasmus project.

So that is an experience that I warmly suggest to every student that has never done it!

Why have you chosen to start the path towards a PhD?
This I think this is a very interesting part of my story. Actually, in six years I have never thought about being a PhD (during my years of studies, I was more oriented about going to work in a company). The Erasmus project and the Master Thesis in Luleå gave me the opportunity to explore more in detail the topic of product innovation and sustainability driven design, and I really enjoyed to work on it. Day by day I started to understand that I was very attracted by these topics, and I was very happy to go everyday to work in my division.

So during my Thesis this is what brought me to think that the PhD would have been the right way for me.

Added on this, what I like most about being a PhD student is to have the opportunity to work in an international environment and to have the possibility to have different kind of experiences during my path in order to grow professionally.

So I am very glad to say that I started the path towards a PhD by choice and not for a pre-planned decision.

Which three words do you think best describes you as a person?
I think I am a friendly person, always ready to give help to my relatives, friends and colleagues.

I am also a rather creative person (my colleagues at the University used to friendly call me “Artistic Engineer”).

I am also very motivated in every idea or adventure I decide to pursue.

What do you like doing in your spare time?
I very much like to read during my spare time, and I consider myself as a real book lover. I also like watching movies, especially the ones from the 60’s and the 70’s (directed by Federico Fellini, Ingmar Bergman etc.).

From the sporty side, I played soccer for several years in Italy, in “1 categoria” (the 8th division of the National Italian football association) while for the last 5 years I have been a coach in a football team (Società Sportiva Valdalpone). Even though I still like to play soccer for fun, I considered that experience over for the moment. I am more interested to practice other hobbies since I moved in Sweden. First of all, I like to go fishing during my spare time, I think it is a relaxing hobby and very good even from a professional point of view (many ideas pop up when fishing).

Of course, I want to continue the activities that I used to practice in Italy, like playing the guitar and the harmonica.

But for the moment, I am focusing most of my spare time to learn and improve my Swedish. Maybe I could not consider this as an hobby, rather I think it is a good way to integrate myself within the Swedish community and to learn more about the Swedish culture and habits.

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