The industrial development in northern part of Scandinavia has for the last years steadily beengrowing, primarily driven by strong expansion in mining, hydro power and wind powerindustries, which influences the growth and also demand on the mechanical industry in thearea. In order to further develop the competitiveness of manufacturing companies and thepromotion of laser technology in the north of Sweden and Finland, three new laser projectswere approved. These projects will be presented in this paper.. One project at LuleåUniversity of Technology (LTU) will support industry to develop and implement lasers inmanufacturing, combined with further development of an interesting laser process useful forthe regional industry. One project is a cooperation project between LTU and University ofOulu that will focus on developing optimal laser welds in high strength steels using highpower fibre- and disc lasers and evaluation of fatigue properties of the welds. The thirdproject deals with fatigue properties of laser clad surfaces and is a cooperation projectbetween LTU and Centria Research unit of Central Osterbothnia of Applies Sciences,involving also Tampere University of Technology.