"The vision of START is to reinforce the cooperation between EU and Ukraine in the field of Superhard Materials and its application areas in the various thematic priorities of FP7. Thus, START will support the Ukraine’s leading research institute in the field of Superhard Materials, namely V.N. Bakul Institute for Superhard Materials of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine (ISM), to become a “flagship institute’ in international cooperation.START will: a) analyse ISM’s research competencies, review the scientific and technological developments and examine the EU/Ukraine’s collaboration framework in order to develop ISM’s long-term Research Strategy and position the Institute in the international research arena; b) set up a consultation, assessment and validation mechanism in a collaborative perspective with EU research actors to monitor the implementation on ISM’s Research Strategy; c) organise a variety of training activities adjusted to the Institute’s support needs building ISM’s competencies towards its participation in future FP7 collaborative research activities; d) deploy a set of diversified twinning activities, to significantly increase ISM’s networking level facilitate the exchange of knowledge and good practices and, thus, prepare the ground for setting Joint Research Plans with EU leading research centres; e) support the implementation of joint research activities between ISM and leading EU research centres in the field of Superhard Materials; and f) facilitate the exchange of research staff between ISM and EU research centres, enabling them to carry out joint experiments and, thus, setting the foundations for long-term collaboration.START will be coordinated by ISM, which is the targeted leading research institute of Ukraine in the field of Superhard Materials, and mobilise a multi-disciplinary consortium of 4 partners (1 from Ukraine and 3 from EU countries), while its duration will be 30 months."