The Ministry of Education revealed the winners of the National Award for Distinguished Contribution to Industry-Academic Cooperation 2020. The results showed that Prof. Dr. Yen-Shin Lai has been recognized with this special honor under his continuing efforts in cultivating vocational talents and his wise solutions to the issues of the industries across engineering, electrical engineering and computer science, and agricultural science. The awarding ceremony will be scheduled to take place after the COVID-19 is well contained.

Lai deserves this special honor for having been devoting to the vocational education for over three decades. He has done for years some of the most unparalleled innovative researches on the variable-frequency driver and high-performance servomotor actuators. His expertise in machine tools, robotics, and electricity supply has facilitated the development of the industries through industry consultancy and industry-academic collaborations. 

Lai is ambitious in helping to build key technologies for the industries in Taiwan with the enormous research capabilities his research team possesses. In return, he is also dedicated to educating those future experts with the resources channeled from the industries. 

The National Award for Distinguished Contribution to Industry-Academic Cooperation, according to the MOE, favors candidates who are making continuous efforts both to the engagement in industry-academic collaborations and to the cultivation of talents. This year, Yen-Shin Lai at Taipei Tech, Chen-Haur Horng at NFU, Sheng-Jin Chen at Taiwan Tech, and Fure-Chyi Chen at NPUST are selected outstanding winners who have significant contributions in their domains.