D1.2 Common Assets Identification and Character is at Ion

FIREBALL D1.2

STATUS: FINAL, VERSION: 1.0, SAVED: 21 APRIL 2012

Framework programme 7 Challenge 1

Page: 1 (143)

Coordinating Action FIREBALL FP7-ICT-2009-5

www.fireball4smartcities.eu

COORDINATING ACTION

FP7-ICT-2009-5

D1.2 – COMMON ASSETS IDENTIFICATION

AND CHARACTERISATION (M24) STATUS: VERSION: FINAL

This document reports the results of FIREBALL WP1 Task1.2 Common Assets Identification and Characterization. This deliverable focuses on identification of common assets (e.g. facilities, methods, communities, open data) that can be made available and shared by different constituencies related to Future Internet, Living Labs and Smart Cities. We present an overview of such common assets based on several cases. Common assets form the basis for the smart cities innovation ecosystem infrastructure.

ABOUT FIREBALL

The over-all objective of the FIREBALL project is to coordinate and align methodologies and approaches in the domains of Future Internet (FI) research and experimentation testbeds and user driven open innovation towards successful innovation in smart city environments. In doing so, and in covering the whole FI research and innovation value chain driven by smart cities being the users of the FI, FIREBALL aims to establish effective forms of cooperation across the FI innovation value chain, creating synergies and cooperation practices among different research and innovation communities related to the FI. www.fireball4smartcities.eu

ATTRIBUTES OF THIS OBJECT

Project Type Coordinating Action Project name FIREBALL Project ID FP7-ICT-2009-5 Deliverable D1.2 (M24) Deliverable name Common Assets Identification and

Characterization Work package WP1, Task 1.2 Version 1.0 (submitted to EC) Status Final Responsible org. ESoCE Net Creators Hans Schaffers, ESoCE Net (Ed.)

Michel Corriou, Pierre François, Yves Savary (MN); Esa Posio (CIE); Marc Pallot, Brigitte Trousse, Bernard Senach, Caroline Tiffon (INRIA); Kim Viljanen, Antti Poikola, Pekka Koponen (Forum Virium / City of Helsinki); Esteve Almirall (ESADE); Annika Sällström (CDT); Nicos Komninos (URENIO); Dave Carter (MDDA).

Submitted 23.04.2012 Approved date Approved by <receiving EC person> Dissemination PUB

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 2 (143)



SECT. CONTENT PAGE

1 INTRODUCTION 3 1.1 OBJECTIVE AND CONTEXT OF THIS REPORT 3 1.2 OVERVIEW 3

2 OVERVIEW PAPER ON COMMON ASSETS 4 2.1 INTRODUCTION 4 2.2 BACKGROUND 5 2.3 METHODOLOGICAL FRAMEWORK 6 2.4 CASE STUDIES OF FIRE, IOT AND LIVING LABS COMMON ASSETS 6 2.5 COMMON ASSETS OPENNESS, ACCESS AND GOVERNANCE 13 2.6 COOPERATION MODELS BUILDING ON OPEN ACCESS MECHANISMS 15 2.7 DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS 16

3 NICE CÔTE D’AZUR COMMON ASSETS CASE STUDY 18 3.1 OVERVIEW 18 3.2 ICT 19 3.3 HEALTH 20 3.4 EDUCATION 21 3.5 SMART CITY 24 3.6 RESEARCH 26 3.7 LIVING LAB AND USER COMMUNITIES 28 3.8 ENABLERS 30 3.9 REGIONAL ASSETS 32

4 HELSINKI COMMON ASSETS CASE STUDY 35 4.1 INTRODUCTION 37 4.2 AN OPEN CITY WITH SMART PEOPLE 39 4.3 A COMPLEX GIANT 51 4.4 THE CITY OF DATA 59 4.5 LESSONS LEARNED 67 4.6 LITERATURE 68

5 OULU COMMON ASSETS CASE STUDY 69 5.1 INTRODUCTION 69 5.2 AVAILABLE ASSETS 69 5.3 COLLABORATION MODELS 95 5.4 ACCESSIBILITY 95

6 BRETAGNE COMMON ASSETS CASE STUDY 96 6.1 INTRODUCTION 96 6.2 OVERVIEW OF COMMON ASSETS 96 6.3 DETAILED ASSETS DESCRIPTIONS 98 6.4 IMAGINLAB TESTBED DESCRIPTION 99 6.5 IMAGINLAB LIVING LAB DESCRIPTION 102 6.6 SERVICES PROVIDED BY THE ASSETS 103 6.7 CURRENT UTILIZATION OF THE ASSETS 104 6.8 ROLE OF THE ASSETS IN THE SMART CITY INNOVATION ECOSYSTEM 104 6.9 LINKAGE OF THE ASSETS TO OTHER ASSETS 104 6.10 USE CASE WITH LANNION SMART CITY 105 6.11 USE CASE WITH BREST SMART CITY 107 6.12 OPEN DATA OPPORTUNITIES & SMART CITIES 110 6.13 ANNEX A: USER PANEL ANALYSIS 113

7 BARCELONA COMMON ASSETS CASE STUDY 119 7.1 OVERVIEW 119 7.2 COMMON ASSETS DESCRIPTIONS 119

8 THESSALONIKI COMMON ASSETS CASE STUDY 129 8.1 BROADBAND 129 8.2 WEB APPLICATIONS AND E-SERVICES 130

9 MANCHESTER COMMON ASSETS CASE STUDY 136 9.1 INTRODUCTION 136 9.2 DIGITAL DEVELOPMENT IN MANCHESTER 137 9.3 MANCHESTER ROADMAP 139

10 CONCLUSIONS AND FOLLOW-UP 141

REFERENCES 143

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 3 (143)



1 INTRODUCTION

1.1 OBJECTIVE AND CONTEXT OF THIS REPORT

Smart Cities innovation ecosystems are based on an infrastructure for innovation. This infrastructure is built upon what within FIREBALL we are calling “common assets”: resources of various types that can be selected, combined, shared and used by those who want to engage in living labs innovation projects. In this report, common assets types such as technical infrastructures, user driven open innovation methods and tools, test bed facilities and user communities are identified and characterized based on a number of cases. The characterization results into an overview and analysis how configurations of such common assets can be tailored to the needs and requirements of Smart Cities.

The work reported in this deliverable forms the basis for describing mechanisms for access and governance of the common assets (D1.3). Also it is of relevance to, and has been developed in close coordination with, the Landscape and Roadmap as developed in D2.1, which contains a number of “Smart City” case studies where common assets are being studied as well.

The work presented in this deliverable has been subject of several FIREBALL workshops where the concept of common assets has been discussed and elaborated:

• Future Interne Assembly (FIA) conference, Ghent, December 2010, workshop on “Smart Cities and Future Internet Experimentation”. Workshop jointly organized with FIRESTATION.

• Future Internet Assembly (FIA) conference, Budapest, May 2011, workshop on “Smart Cities and FIRE: Experimentation and Living Labs for the Future Internet”. Workshop jpointly organized with FIRESTATION.

• ICE 2011 conference, June 2011, Aachen: workshop “Common Assets for Smart Cities Living Labs Innovation: IT Infrastructures, methods and user communities”.

The work has been subject of elaborate discussions with FIA members and also has resulted in a joint proposal for a Support Action in FP7-ICT (currently under evaluation).

1.2 OVERVIEW

Section 2 presents an overview of the common assets concept illustrated with some examples (paper presented at the ICE 2011 conference and published at IEEE Xplore).

Sections 3-8 bring together a number of cases of common assets identification.

• Nice Côte d’Azur (prepared by partner INRIA)

• Oulu (prepared by partner CIE)

• Barcelona (prepared by partners ESADE)

• Bretagne (prepared by partner MN)

• Thessaloniki (prepared by partner Urenio)

• Manchester (prepared by partner MDDA).

Finally, the report formulates conclusions and follow up in section 9, and provides References in section 10.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 4 (143)



2 OVERVIEW PAPER ON COMMON ASSETS This chapter presents an extended version of the paper that was accepted for the 17th International Conference on Concurrent Enterprising ICE 2011 (June 2011, Aachen). Published at IEEE Xplore: http://ieeeexplore.ieee.org/

Integrating Living Labs with Future Internet Experimental Platforms for Co-creating Services within Smart Cities

Hans Schaffers (ESoCE Net), Marc Pallot (INRIA), Annika Sällström (CDT), José Hernandez-Muñoz (Telefónica), Roberto Santoro (ESoCE Net), Brigitte Trousse (INRIA)

Abstract

This paper examines the potential integration of living labs concepts of open and user driven innovation with Future Internet experimentally driven research approaches, in order to accelerate the user-driven development towards Smart Cities and Smart Regions. The need to enhance user support and involvement in experimental research, and provide access to common resources, such as testbed facilities and living lab resources, constitute the two key issues in the process of integration. To study these issues we discuss three case studies from current FP7-ICT projects: SmartSantander, TEFIS and ELLIOT. On the basis of the study outcome, this paper describes a framework towards the development of Smart City experimental environments integrating both research and innovation. These environments are intended to provide access, share and integrate common capabilities, resources, facilities and methods from the domains of Living Labs, FIRE and Internet of Things testbeds.

Keywords

Future Internet, Experimental Facilities, Framework, Living Labs, Experimentation, Internet of Things, Smart Cities

2.1 INTRODUCTION

Exploring, experimenting and evaluating Future Internet (FI) concepts, technological artefacts and scenarios is not a trivial challenge due to the complexity of issues and diversity of stakeholders. This is especially true when several research communities are involved in this process through different research streams and methodology traditions such as ‘Future Internet Research and Experimentation’ (FIRE), ‘Living Labs’, ‘Internet of Things’ (IoT) and ‘Smart Cities’, to cite a few. Further to this, engaging all stakeholders, including communities of users/citizens, for co-creating Future Internet value in solving important societal issues, makes it even more complex. Today, involving users in research, design and innovation processes constitutes a fast growing topic as shown by the exponential growth of the European Network of Living Labs (ENoLL) with currently more than 200 Living Labs. However, Living Labs need technology platforms such as the ones proposed by the FIRE project community and IoT testbeds where stakeholders can co-create, explore, experiment and evaluate new scenarios such as energy management, smart mobility, environment monitoring and homecare services that contribute to turn traditional cities into Smart Cities. The challenge is therefore to identify how to properly articulate Living Labs with FIRE and IoT testbeds in order to make sure that Future Internet innovative services will meet the expectations and desires of user communities.

This paper looks at insights and emerging experiences regarding the integration of Living Labs, Future Internet and Internet of Things platforms targeting service innovation, based on-going FP7 ICT project cases in particular TEFIS, SmartSantander and ELLIOT. A key objective is to propose a framework towards

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 5 (143)



the development of Smart Cities experimental environments based on such integration, with emphasis on mechanisms to ensure easy access and governance of common research and innovation resources. Based on these project cases and on mechanisms for openness and access to common resources, we explore new ways of collaborative innovation among stakeholders.

2.2 BACKGROUND

A city can be termed “smart” when “investments in human and social capital and traditional (transport) and modern (ICT) communication infrastructure fuel sustainable economic growth and a high quality of life, with a wise management of natural resources, through participatory governance” [Caragliu a.o. 2009]. Whereas the current Internet and broadband infrastructure is already an indispensable component of urban innovation ecosystems nowadays, the emerging Future Internet constitutes a key infrastructural requirement for the future to fulfil the promise of the smart city concept. Such innovation ecosystems will facilitate the co-creation of services, in environments that stimulate open innovation and early end-user involvement.

Therefore, a challenge of paramount importance is to bring together the methodological approaches of Future Internet and of Living Labs within the policy setting of Smart Cities. Current FIRE projects are setting up federated and interconnected experimental facilities for enabling experimental research. Primarily, the FI experimental research aims at investigating and validating innovative networking architectures and service paradigms. Several projects are targeting technologies and service concepts of high importance for end-user applications, such as Panlab (Web TV over mobile), TEFIS (mobile content sharing), Bonfire (on-demand applications) and Smart Santander (Internet of Things experimental facilities at urban scale). Other projects in FP7-ICT as well as in the CIP ICT-PSP also address Internet technologies, such as Internet of Things and sensor networks, and promote end-user involvement in co-creation, exploration, experimentation and evaluation (ELLIOT, Peripheria). We also refer to the C@R Integrated Project [Schaffers, García, Navarro, Merz (eds.) 2010] and the currently running Apollon project because both provide examples of sharing diverse resources, such as technologies, service components, platforms, living lab facilities and business ecosystem concepts across multiple pilots at different locations.

The ability to assess the impact of technological changes to the Internet in socioeconomic terms is considered by the FIRE community as an essential element. For that purpose it is necessary to involve user communities on a large scale at an early stage of development. Whereas FIRE stakeholders have been mainly targeting experimentation services to the R&D community, they have observed a need to enhance end-user support and involvement, which is considered as a relatively new and untested concept. They currently investigate in how far they can benefit from the methodologies of mature living labs, for example as developed and applied within the European Network of Living Labs1. In a Living Lab, relevant stakeholders are integrated in a flexible service and technology innovation ecosystem. Bringing users at an early stage into the research and innovation process allows all stakeholders, including businesses and industry, to better discover new scenarios and emerging patterns of behaviours as well as new usages, and to assess the socioeconomic implications of emerging technological solutions. In turn, Living labs may benefit from the available technological facilities provided by FIRE experimental research projects.

1 www.openlivinglabs.eu

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 6 (143)



2.3 METHODOLOGICAL FRAMEWORK

This paper reports three short case studies, illustrating the interaction potential and integration of experimental research on the Future Internet as well as living labs methodologies. These case studies also provide insights in the effective integration, use and sharing of both Future Internet, IoT and living labs resources. Such resources or “assets” include technologies, methods, experiments and instrumentations, technologies, facilities, user groups. The table below (see Table 1) presents the typology of common resources and services offered by the resources.

Resource type Services offered

Network infrastructure Broadband communication, enabling high bandwidth applications

Testbed facilities Software /hardware platform for technology testing

Testbed methods Testing and validation process

Living Lab facilities User driven applications development

Living Lab methodology User engagement, cyclic development, action research, data collection

Human capital Expertise, know-how (Future Internet, applications, business)

User community Availability of advanced users for experimentation and evaluation

Collaboration platform Enabling interaction between users, developers, stakeholders

Technologies, know-how Application opportunities

Public data / information Information, applications

Policy resources Access to funding opportunities, organizational capabilities, networking enablers, innovation policies and programs

Capability to develop and run pilots

Capability to initiate and develop Future Internet and Living Labs projects to support smart city objectives

Social capital Actor networks and actor relations

Table 1: Common assets for Future Internet experimentation and Living Labs

Assets include human, technological and infrastructural resources (capital goods) that are underlying the smart city. Assets may include network infrastructures, experimentation facilities, living labs, know-how and technologies, human capital, user communities, as well as the assets embodied in the existing research and innovation ecosystem. The three cases focus on identifying the resources, named “common assets” that are available to facilitate, when made accessible and shared, the transformation towards a “Smart City”. They result in the identification and typology of common resources and of interfaces and linkages across the experimental research approaches and living lab methodologies. According to this bottom up approach, the case studies provide also a set of requirements for realising the integration in next-phase projects. We aim to develop and propose a collaboration framework for sharing resources and methodologies that would guide future projects aiming to accelerate the Future Internet development towards smart cities at the EU scale.

2.4 CASE STUDIES OF FIRE, IOT AND LIVING LABS COMMON ASSETS

In several projects, attempts are made to integrate FIRE, IoT and living labs resources. The following cases will be presented in this paper in order to gain insights and experiences and draw lessons learned:

• SmartSantander: A city-scale experimental research facility in support of typical applications and services for a smart city.

• TEFIS (Testbed for Future Internet Services). A single access point to run Future Internet experiments by combining different testbed resources.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 7 (143)



• ELLIOT (Experiential Living Lab for the Internet of Things): An Internet of Things experiential platform where users / citizens are directly involved in the research and innovation process.

SmartSantander: A City-wide Experimental Facility

The SmartSantander research facility will be sufficiently large, open and flexible to enable horizontal and vertical federation with other experimental facilities and to stimulate the development of new applications by different types of users, including experimental advanced research on IoT technologies, and realistic impact assessment based on users’ acceptability tests. The facility will comprise more than 20,000 sensors and will be based on a real life IoT deployment in an urban setting. The core of the facility will be located in the city of Santander and its surroundings, on the north coast of Spain. SmartSantander embraces the idea of enabling the Future Internet of Things to become a reality applying a living labs approach.

Although the main target of SmartSantander is research oriented to create a large-scale testbed allowing open experimentation with key enabling IoT device technologies, it is obvious that such a kind of realistic setting grants the potential of involving real end-users in the experimentation process. There is a long list of potential applications identified by SmartSantander, in close cooperation with the City Council and the Regional Government of Cantabria, as suitable to be supported by the infrastructure being deployed. Most of them offer a big environmental and social potential: parking spaces and traffic control, environmental management and monitoring (pollution, CO2, noise, etc.), public installations management (heating, A/C, lighting, etc.), public transportation, parks and gardens control (irrigation, etc), social assistance (elderly, disabled, etc.), etc. Due to time and budget limitations, during the execution of the project just some specific services will be deployed in order to validate the asset deployed. Other interesting services are expected to come up later on as a result of parallel initiatives linked to the project at the regional level, as the project is committed to ensure the availability of the infrastructure beyond the end of the project.

The asset will be operated and maintained by the consortium during the execution of the project. After that period, several solutions are being considered. Among the choices that are being currently envisaged, and will be further analized, are the creation of a new legal entity for its exploitation, and/or the transfer of both maintenance obligations and ownership to a third party. In both cases, the use of the asset would have to be bound to legal and financial conditions.

The benefits of the infrastructure addressed by the SmartSantander project are two-fold:

• The deployed facility will enable a wide range of experimentations, supporting different technology aspects and catering for different user groups (researchers, service providers, and end users). Furthermore, through FIRESTATION CA, the project collaborates with other FIRE projects to allow the federation with their respective experimental facilities.

• SmartSantander aims at optimizing the societal benefits of investing to build up such a city-scale infrastructure, so its been designed to support real life services, useful to the citizen, at the same time it copes with its primary target of providing an ambitious experimentation platform for the research community. E.g. first cycle deployment will consist of a big number of parking sensors able to provide support for experimentation of multi-hop techniques on different topologies, and will also provide the City Council means to control the proper use of the parking spaces reserved to disabled people.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 8 (143)



Asset type Specification of the asset Shareable asset

Network infrastructure

Heterogeneous Wireless Sensor Network, with specific experimentation capabilities allowing remote configuration of the different types of nodes (sensors, repeaters, and gateways).

It will be available under specific conditions: experiments to be carried out on top of it should pass a ‘sanity test’ to ensure they do not compromise the infrastructure itself. Deep technological knowledge would be required.

Software applications

Basic applications for node configuration and management in order to be able to validate the operation of the system. Initial approach of first set of service oriented applications related to the management of the parking spaces.

Access to basic applications would be granted for experimentation purposes in case it is required. Applications for specific services being competence of the municipality not within the scope.

Innovation environments user communities

Currently not available. They will be addressed during the execution of the project, once the infrastructure is available, to involve third parties and end-users in the creation of services based on the sensors’ data.

Will be available in the future, based on a Living Labs approach. The access will be limited to non-sensitive information to guarantee personal data protection, and prevent misuse of the information provided.

Sustainability and exploitation plan

Information of the outmost importance to describe the models being considered within the project, with emphasis on those more suitable to guarantee the sustainability of the infrastructure.

The report analyzing potential exploitation models will be also publicly available through the project web-site at: http://www.smartsantander.eu.

Public data / information

A number of different information categories will be opened up to the public, to enable the use of applications, and the development of new ones.

Open APIs for accessing data will be made available at three different levels: research and developers’ community, Service Providers (ISPs), and end-user.

Table 2: Smart Santander Most Important Common assets

Apart form this, SmartSantander is aware of its potential to reduce time to market for new services, by shortening required R&D cycles, providing a fast end-user feedback for the assessment on socio-economic impact to the European researchers and service developers, and helping to make technology benefits more visible to the EU citizens. This will be facilitated by the deployment of novel IoT solutions and application pilots on a realistic target environment involving real end-users. Besides, early end-user exposure to the first applications and services based on IoT technologies can encourage its adoption and lower the boundaries of social acceptance by the public, which often acts as an inhibitor of technological advance.

By the time this paper was prepared, the first deployment phase was being carried out in Santander. By June 2011, most part of the first 2,000 sensors corresponding to the first phase of the project will have been deployed across the city. Using this preliminary approach to the final testbed, the project will issue the first Open Call to select proposals to be funded in order to run experimental research on top of it. At the same time, end-user perception with regard to the first services will be analyzed by means of surveys among the citizenship, and some services related to specific urban mobility use-cases will be further improved under a Customer Driven Innovation approach (CDI). These methodologies are also common to most Living Labs experiences. In the future stages of the project, and once the assets become progressively and publicly available, it is expected to involve wider communities in the usage of the infrastructure.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 9 (143)



TEFIS: Future Internet experiments by combining different testbed resources

The TEFIS Integrated Project supports research on various future large-scale and resource-hungry Internet service technologies. It offers an open platform to access heterogeneous and complementary experimental facilities, including living lab facility, and testing tools to be used by service developers supporting the service development life-cycle. TEFIS explores a scenario where experimenters start a service development cycle in a living lab, developing a service concept with end-users. Thereafter, service development and evaluation start in using experimental facilities to test technologies. Finally the business model and business concept can be co-developed with interested stakeholders including end-users. TEFIS supports Future Internet of Services research by offering a single access point to different testing and experimental facilities for communities of software and business developers to test, experiment, and collaboratively elaborate knowledge. The project develops an open platform to access heterogeneous and complementary experimental facilities addressing the full development lifecycle of innovative services with the appropriate tools and testing methodologies. Through the TEFIS platform users will be supported throughout the whole experiment lifecycle by access to different testing tools covering most of the software development-cycle activities such as software build and packaging, compliance tests, system integration, SLA dimensioning, large-scale deployment, and user evaluation of run-time services. The platform provides the necessary services that will allow the management of underlying testbeds resources. In particular, it handles generic resource management, resource access scheduling, software deployment, matching and identification of resources that can be activated, and measurement services for a variety of testbeds.

TEFIS is selected as example of bringing together Future Internet / IoT and living labs resources for the purpose of smart city innovations or other desired outcomes of the project because of the following:

• An experimental platform for Smart Cities development empowered by Future Internet technologies

• An open framework that will allow efficient combination of various experimental facilities to support the heterogeneity aspects of Future internet experiments including the end-user involvement

• A platform to share expertise and best practices for higher “smartness” by shared intelligence and experiences

Two main types of assets are available via TEFIS for future Smart Cities experimentations: the TEFIS platform and the TEFIS testbed facilities provided by testbed partners of TEFIS.

The following project case illustrates how in TEFIS resources are combined and shared. This specific Future Internet experiment is combining experimental resources from two different testbeds: the SQS IMS testbed in Spain and the Botnia Living Lab in Sweden. The experiment is focused on a mobile application over IMS, and is divided into three different phases of the service development life-cycle: concept development, prototype development and Business model definition. This experiment addresses the three main issues facing mobile applications today. First, this experiment will explore end- user feedback to check if the application is suitable for them. In the second step, they will use testbed facilities as a validation tool, and in the third step, to find out the correct business model for long-term sustainability.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 10 (143)



Asset type Specification of the asset Shareable asset


Planetlab: powerful infrastructure consisting of 1018 nodes for testing and evaluation of network protocols and distributed systems on a large scale. PACA Grid: a computing infrastructure for large-scale computations and a number of tools to automatically deploy and execute distributed applications and to monitor the progress of the computation and retrieve the results. ETICS: a build and test job execution system based on the Metronome software and an integrated set of web services and software engineering tools to design, maintain and control build and test scenarios. SQS IMS: Assets: The emulated IMS platform with IMS Core services, Presence and Group management, Push-to-talk, IMS Messaging, Instant messaging and Instant Multimedia Messaging, GSMA video/image share and enhanced VoIP and IMS Core Network emulator. Wizards and templates included in the tools are used for testing purposes. KyaTera: A high speed network of over 266 km of optical cables with 8 to 144 fibres and a network measurement tool to measure network status as bandwidth, jitter, delay, ping between two nodes, packet loss etc.

For sharing outside the TEFIS CA of these assets each Testbed facility provider has its own regulation for sharing and access to their assets.


The TEFIS platform is organized into four main functional blocks: TEFIS Portal, TEFIS Middleware, TEFIS testbed connectors and TEFIS User tools.. The User tools will be external tools, which could not be free, that the TEFIS platform can embed in a future next step

The TEFIS platform it is being developed under the conditions of the Open License Terms.


Botnia Living Lab: Research expertise in end-user evaluation and testing, the FormIT methodology for end-user involvement, a database of 6000 creative end-users in Sweden and access to end-users around the world via 3rd parties.

These assets are available to any user and access is regulated depending on what kind of resources, Handbooks are available

Sustainability and exploitation plan

Assets above provided via the different actors of TEFIS are in use today in internal cases and with external actors. Exploitation work is in progress on the networked offers for users of the facilities and for the Tefis facility itself. A specific framework is used for the exploitation and sustainability processes.

Framework for business model creation, development and evaluation.


Depending on users and each experiment data can be made public. At the minimum general information about each experiment is to be public available for knowledge sharing and visibility.

General information about each experiment using the TEFIS portal for their performance.

Table 3: TEFIS Project Most Important Common assets

The experimenter has an idea of developing an application for content sharing over IMS. The first step of the experiment is to get further insights from potential end-users via Botnia Living Lab before starting the development and to be able to prioritize their development efforts, they will then continue through to the second phase where the experimenter has a first prototype available of the application and is performing system acceptance testing (including functional and non-functional) via the IMS testbed and usefulness and usabilty evaluation with end-users via resources from Botnia Living Lab. In the third phase before roll-out the experimenter will involve their potential business partner to work on the business model definition and to elaborate on the business partnership. They In this third phase both end-users feedback and network usage is monitored and analysed. The phase involves resources from both Botnia Living Lab and from the IMS testbed.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 11 (143)



Fig. 1: Overview TEFIS experimental procedure

The TEFIS platform is offering the following to support Future Internet experiments: designing, planning, management of experimental workflow, configuration assistance, experimental data management, reporting, knowledge sharing with other experimenters and access to different testbed facilities and service offers independent of geographical location.

ELLIOT: An Experiential Living Lab for the Internet of Things

The ELLIOT project aims to develop an IoT experiential platform where users/citizens are directly involved in co-creating, exploring, experimenting and evaluating new ideas, concepts and technological artefacts related to IOT applications and services. It is intended to allow studying the potential impact of IoT and the Future Internet in the context of the Open User Centred Innovation paradigm and of the Living Lab approach within three different use cases. In this paper the focus is on the green services use case that constitutes a building block of environment monitoring in the Smart City. The green services use case has its origin in the ICT Usage Lab, which is located in the South East of France and is run in the urban community of Nice Cote d’Azur (NCA). The green services use case is supported by local authorities and involves the local stakeholders such as the local institution (AtmoPaca) for the measurement of air quality.

Citizens do not seem to feel so much concerned about air quality despite the availability of advanced models (AtmoPaca) which can produce reliable indicators as well as portals providing access to such measures. The main use of such data seems to be limited to population alert (elderly people, children and people with cardio-respiratory problems). The working hypothesis is that a citizen may better engage in the use (if not even in the creation) of green services (services using environmental data, in this case air quality and/or noise level) when being given the opportunity to learn and use IoT set-ups that will allow a better appropriation of the environmental data.

The Green Services is supported by INRIA (Sophia Antipolis), FING and VU Log (France). The objectives of this use case are:

• To define within an open participative innovation process "green services" for citizens and city administrators in charge of air quality and noise disturbance. These green services will be based on the collection and processing of collected pollution data and will allow users to tailor their own information space about local pollution;

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 12 (143)



• To study the feasibility of a distributed mobile network of pollution sensors to collect environmental data;

• To study the impacts on citizens’ behaviour and recommendations related to environment monitoring (e.g. pollution level).

Green Services are based on both fixed and mobile sensors (green watches and electrical vehicles) and supported by a green services portal. Types of mobile sensors used are the Green Watch (watch-embedded environmental sensors and noise sensors to collect environmental data), and the Sensor Vehicle (electric vehicles equipped with proper sensors to collect environmental data). Users involved in this Green Services testbed are citizen (citizen from a given neighbourhood, citizens with cardio-respiratory problems or sportsmen) and other environment monitoring stakeholders (such as local policy makers, environmental specialists, urban architects, etc.). ELLIOT Green Services common assets are decribed in the table below (see Table 4). Asset types Specification of assets Shareable assets

Technologies and infrastructures

Distributed mobile network of pollution sensors to collect environmental data. The Green Watch: watch-embedded environmental sensors and noise sensors to collect environmental data;

The Sensor Vehicle: electric vehicles equipped with proper sensors to collect environmental data.

It is intended to open the access to collected environmental data to citizens and other stakeholders that they could co-create their own services.

Will be made available on the ICT Usage Lab web-site.


Environmental data website such as AtmoPaca website for air quality in the PACA region.

Green services website for supporting citizens driven services such as mobility services and wellbeing services.

Both websites are intended to be publicly accessible.

Links will be included on the ICT Usage Lab web-site.


The ICT Usage Lab constitutes the multidisciplinary research and innovation ecosystem.

The ERIC (Espace Régionaux Internet Citoyens) local structure provides the user communities, which are Internet Regional Spaces for Citizens.

Access to local infrastructures and facilities such as Gerhome Lab, Ubiquarium, Webusage Lab, FocusLab and Mymed, will be made availability on the ICT Usage Lab web-site.

Access to user communities, such as ERIC

Innovation and testing methodologies

Participative Requirements techniques and serious gaming for supporting the creativity and requirements workshops.

User engagement, cyclic development, action research, data collection

Usage Mining and behavioural analysis

Ethnographic and ergonomic study

Available on the ICT Usage Lab web-site.

Sustainability & exploitation plan

The sustainability of the infrastructure. Will be made available on the ICT Usage Lab web-site.

Other assets (policy, funding, partnerships etc)

The impact on local policies and citizens behaviour change will be reported.

Partnerships and funding sources will be reported.

Will be made available on the ICT Usage Lab web-site.


Environmental data website such as AtmoPaca website for air quality in the PACA region.

Green services website for supporting citizens driven services such as mobility services and wellbeing services.

Open APIs for accessing data will be made available.


Develop and deploy Future Internet services projects within Nice Cote d’Azur (NCA).

Capabilities will be made available on the ICT Usage Lab website.

Table 4: ELLIOT Green Services Common assets

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 13 (143)



2.5 COMMON ASSETS OPENNESS, ACCESS AND GOVERNANCE

Based on the cases presented, this section aims to provide a framework for interested members from different Future Internet communities, Living Labs and the Smart Cities community for sharing capabilities and resources offered by existing smart city platforms, testbeds and living labs facilities. It provides arrangements related to IPR management, legal issues and partnership agreements to implement open innovation approach.

Common Assets Characterisation

The Common Assets to be made available to the members of the communities are of a different nature ranging from know-how, to software, to user communities, to tangible assets and require different business and legal arrangements and access mechanisms. The following table 5 provides a simplified typology of Common Assets and their characterization.

Asset Types Ownership IPR Access conditions

Access mechanisms

Technology infrastructure


User communities

Innovation methodologies

Table 5: Typology of common assets characterisation

• Ownership. The legal entity owning the asset can make it available to the Communities. Ownership can be joint as often is the case in research and development projects. In this case special access conditions are normally granted to the project participants for the use of projects results. In research and innovation projects, this term means licences and user rights to foreground results or background Information and intellectual property.

• IPR Intellectual Property Rights. Intellectual Property: any patent, registered design, copyright, design right, database right, topography right, trade mark, service mark, application to register any of the aforementioned rights, trade secret, right in unpatented know-how, right of confidence and any other intellectual or industrial property right of any nature whatsoever in any part of the world; IP can be made available to others through a Licence.

• Access Conditions. Such access conditions can be Free, Preferential or at Market value.

• Access Mechanisms. The actual access to the assets is granted trough a contractual arrangement (typically for accessing tangible assets) or open licence mechanisms such as Creative Commons (typically for methodologies) or General Public Licences (typical of Open Software). For example in the case of the TEFIS federated testbed, access to TEFIS portal general services is granted through a Public Licence while access to specific testbed facilities is different from each provider and depend on the business model definition of the individual testbed providers, their value propositions as well as payment models. The technical use of the assets requires specific expertise, and is supported by the testbed providers.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 14 (143)



Common Assets Governance

The Future Internet, Living Labs and Smart Cities Communities are creating a large amount of Common Assets, which they wish to make available to all communities. To support that goal, the basic approach suggested is to create a single catalogue, accessible through a portal. The advantage of this approach is the flexibility and the freedom of contribution that leaves the different constituencies to cooperate and share these assets without losing their independence. The characteristics of this approach are:

• Each organization is responsible to update the description of its assets in the catalogue, using a wiki approach.

• All the shared assets will be included in the catalogue together with the information and the processes to access them.

• Each organization maintains its independence and any ownership rights are not affected by this process of virtual collaboration.

This approach would also require the inclusion of a facilitator role, in charge of keeping the integrity of the catalogue and of supporting collaboration requests. An organization interested in launching a specific project can address directly the owner of the requested assets or ask the support of the facilitator for activating the access request processes suitable for the specific experimentation (including also any contractual aspect). The logic described can be illustrated as in figure 2.

Fig. 2: Logic of Common Assets Governance Model

The proposed governance structure is based on the well-established organizational forms of Collaborative Networked Organizations [Camarinha-Matos, Afsarmanesh, Ollus 2008]. In particular we propose to establish an Open Association of Legal Entities (FIREBALL Alliance) which intends to favour the launch of Future Internet Experimentations projects in real life environments (i.e. pilots). Each member would provide the description and access mechanisms for its owned assets. The legal nature of the Association will be an “Unincorporated Association”. The Sustainability of the Association is based on membership fees and by contributions of voluntary work by the members. The main body of the association is a Steering Committee, composed by one member from each of the founding members, in charge of keeping the information on available Common Assets up-to-date. The Steering Committee also facilitates the creation of the specific Experimentation Projects for the projects to be launched, governed by a separate agreement. A proposed scheme for the Legal Framework and IPR management of the proposed Association is currently in development in the FIREBALL project.

Experimentati

Required

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 15 (143)



2.6 COOPERATION MODELS BUILDING ON OPEN ACCESS MECHANISMS

Based on the cases and on mechanisms for access, sharing and governance of common assets, we seek to elaborate a simplified framework and typology of effective forms of collaboration to accelerate the development towards open innovation for “smart cities”. Two levels of collaboration can be distinguished, namely, strategic collaboration for setting up innovation conditions and operational collaboration for implementing innovation processes.

Strategic collaboration for open innovation is grounded on formal agreements regarding access to and sharing of common resources, as discussed in the former section. Additionally, such strategic collaboration requires sustainable partnerships or “business models” at the level of urban and regional development, including municipal and regional authorities, research institutes, societal institutions and companies. This approach is common to the SmartSantander project and the Future Internet Private Public Partnership initiatives.

Operational collaboration among Future Internet, Living Labs and Smart Cities initiatives and resources requires the definition of collaboration processes and infrastructures around a specific innovation activity. As an example, within TEFIS a simple collaboration model has been elaborated for the purpose to serve an experimenter and to boost the usage of different assets from individual facilities as a unified service-offer to attract more users of the facilities and to be able to serve the fully service development life-cycle of a Future Internet service developer. In the first phase, Botnia Living Lab is used as a design tool facility. The second phase of prototype validation utilises functional testing capabilities of IMS facility (IP Multimedia System). The third phase of business validation builds on joint use and integration of Botnia Living lab and IMS facility.

Figure 3: TEFIS, ELLIOT & SmartSantander Collaboration Frameworks

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 16 (143)



In the TEFIS project, setting this operational collaboration between testbed providers and Living Lab providers is orchestrated by a webbased portal for facility providers and experimenters to plan, run and support integrated experiments and to share knowledge with others. Other more complex, concurrent engineering based, configurations of using available facilities can be relevant for different and more complex use cases. Based on such “innovation-based” collaboration frameworks, which should be flexible models adaptable to situational context, a set of component processes can be identified and elaborated that govern the actual collaboration and define the “reference framework for common assets collaboration”. Among the key components within this reference framework will be the following processes, which cover innovation phases 1) setup of the innovation partnership (inception), 2) plan and develop the innovation project, 3) operate the innovation process, 4) complete and terminate the innovation process.

• Finding partners, agreeing contracts for collaboration, setting up a collaboration network

• Establish roles, obligations, tasks, work plans for experimentation and testing

• Setup collaboration support for development and experiments team activities

• Identify facilities, know-how, human capital to be brought together in the project

• Define project and team composition

• Select and operate civic user groups for testing and validation

• Carry out product/service development activity based on user group brainstorming

• Manage and maintaining user communities and user engagement

• Prototype software solutions (e.g. using agile development approaches such as SCRUM)

• Moderate user-developer interactions in applications development and testing

• Field trials organisation and execution

• Technology testing in Future Internet testbed facility

• Societal or market-oriented pilots organisation and execution

• Handling of legal and IPR issues

• Evaluate experiment results and provide feedback to developers and users.

2.7 DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS

This paper explored the integration of living labs concepts with Future Internet and Internet of Things experimentally driven research approaches. On the one hand there is a clear need to enhance user involvement and user support in experimental research related to the Future Internet. On the other hand, open and user driven innovation such as in Living Labs often requires the access to testbed facilities and technical resources and capabilities. We therefore foresee an increasing need to create easy and context-specific access to common technical and non-technical resources and capabilities that can be shared for complex experimentation and innovation projects. To accomplish that goal to setup and operate such experimentation and innovation environments, issues such as technical access, access and sharing conditions, ownership and IPR should be resolved. The three cases show initial attempts to cope with these issues. We recommend that these cases are closely followed and evaluated. Follow-up work should extend these attempts to create mechanisms and bridge platforms for facilitating demand-driven experimental environments for Smart Cities and Smart Regions.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 17 (143)



Acknowledgement

This work has been partly funded by the European Commission through FP7-ICT projects FIREBALL, ELLIOT, TEFIS and Smart Santander. The authors wish to acknowledge the Commission for their support. We also wish to acknowledge our gratitude and appreciation to all the project partners for their contribution during the development of various ideas and concepts presented in this paper.

References

Bergvall-Kåreborn, B., Ihlström Eriksson, C., Ståhlbröst, A., & Svensson, J. (2009). A Milieu for Innovation - Defining Living Lab. Accepted to the 2nd ISPIM Innovation Symposium, New York, December 6-9.

Camarinha-Matos, L., Afsarmanesh, H., Ollus, M. (2008): Methods and Tools for Collaborative Networked Organisations. Springer.

Komninos, N.: Intelligent Cities: Innovation, knowledge systems and digital spaces. London and New York, Taylor and Francis, (2002).

Komninos N.: Intelligent Cities and Globalisation of Innovation Networks. London and New York, Routledge (2008).

Kroes, N. (2010):The critical role of cities in making the Digital Agenda a reality. Closing speech to Global Cities Dialogue Spring Summit of Mayors Brussels, 28 May 2010.

Pallot, M, Trousse, B., Senach, B., Scapin, D.: Living Lab Research Landscape: From User Centred Design and User Experience Towards User Co-creation. Position Paper, First Living Labs Summer School (www-sop.inria.fr/llss2010/), Paris, August (2010).

Schaffers, H., Navarro, M., Merz, C. Eds. (2010): Rural Development and Rural Living Labs. Tragsa, Madrid.

Schaffers, H., Komninos, N., Pallot, M., Trousse, B., Nilsson, M., Oliveira, A. (2011): Smart Cities and the Future Internet: Towards Cooperation Frameworks for Open Innovation. In: J. Domingue et al (Eds.): Future Internet: Achievements and Promises. Springer, 2011.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 18 (143)



3 NICE CÔTE D’AZUR COMMON ASSETS CASE STUDY

3.1 OVERVIEW

Asset type Services offered


Broadband communication, enabling high bandwidth applications

Wireless Broadband Network (Orange Labs), Optical fibre, P2P (BitTorent), Content Centric Network, Delayed Tolerant Network, Grid Computing, Cloud Computing. Software Infrastructure,

Testbed facilities Software /hardware platform for technology testing • Immersive Space (CPER PACA Telius) • PACA Grid (CPER Paca Telius) • Cloud Computing • Telecom Platform (Telecom valley, SCS, mobile sector) • FocusLab platform (CPER Paca Telius) for usage analysis

Testbed methods Testing and validation process

In the Living lab ICT Usage lab, each project is responsible for its testing and validation process but it always involve end-users and relies on a coupling of qualitative and quantitative analysis : data logs are combined with questionnaire and observations.

Living Lab facilities

See the facilities on ICT Usage Lab website:

http://www.ictusagelab.org/

Infrastructure: • Webusage Lab (collect & analyse behavioural data)

• Gerhome Lab (a flat of 40 square meters for Ambient Assisted Living services)

• Mymed (a P2P software platform for creating and sharing services among citizens)

• FocusLab (tools for usage analysis and user centered methods)

Main Projects: • ELLIOT (FP7 ICT STREP)

• Fireball (FP7 ICT CSA) • TIC-TAC (Predit)

Living Lab methodology

User engagement, cyclic development, action research, data collection • Focus Group • User Centred Design • Field Studies • Ethnographic Studies

Multidisciplinary approach for evaluating services and analysing usage for understanding user experiences

Human capital Expertise, know-how (Future Internet, applications, business) • Cognitive Psychology • Ergonomic Design • Human Factors • Data Mining, Usage Mining, Web Mining • Artificial Intelligence • Computer Science • Network and Software Engineering

User community Availability of advanced users for experimentation and evaluation • ERIC sites (Regional Spaces Internet – Citizen) – • Arsenic Association • Citizen Associations such as (Femmes3000, CODERPA) • Transportation user associations

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 19 (143)



(continued)

Asset type Services offered

Collaboration platform

Enabling interaction between users, developers, stakeholders

Within projects of the ICT Usage Lab, ad hoc collaboration tools are used for idea generation (for instance Ideastream tool)

Technologies, know-how

Application opportunities

Application opportunities are around TIC usage in following domains: e-services, e-health, energy efficiency, transport …..


Atmopaca provides access to air quality data website: http://www.atmopaca.org/


Paca1 Region has set up specific fundings for user centered innovation (Pacalabs, see below). Partnership with Italy is funded by Alcotra



Collaboration between FI, ICT usage lab living lab and NCA territory via funding from PacaLabs call and PPP Call 2

Other -

3.2 ICT

HPC-SME Initiative

HPC-SME Initiative

Supercomputing within the reach of SMEs HPC-SME Initiative is a program launched jointly by Inria with GENCI, OSEO, and four global competitiveness clusters.

Objective To facilitate and encourage SME access to high-performance computing (HPC), a luxury often reserved for only large industrial groups. Because it can shorten the time for testing services and products and process large amounts of mixed data, the use of supercomputing allows SMEs to remain aggressive on competitive, changing markets.

Facilities The HPC-SME Initiative offer

Program actions are undertaken in a customized, long-term dynamic of stimulation, qualification, development and monitoring of projects.

Coordinated jointly by the stakeholders (computing resources, expertise, financing and ecosystems of innovation), the program offers four things to companies:

• Training and sharing of best practice

• Expertise based in particular on a transfer of skills from public research

• Access to supercomputing equipment

• Help with integration in innovation financing systems

Methodology How to access the HPC-SME Initiative program

To access to the program, candidates have to apply by submitting a preliminary file online.

More information http://www.initiative-hpc-pme.org/

1 PACA stands for "Provence Alpes Côte d'Azur".

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 20 (143)



Telecom Platform

Telecom Platform

Consortium of major actors: 3Roam, Demtech, Ericsson, Eurécom, iQsim, INRIA, Monaco Télécom, Newsteo, ST Ericsson, Udcast… labelled and ported by world class SCS Cluster

Objective To provide to players in the field, a unique development and testing environment for wireless communication solutions, integrating various technologies: high speed mobile (4G/LTE), IMS, mobile TV, wireless sensors and networks…).

Axe 1: Future high speed wireless networks and services

Axe 2: M2M applications, network, things communication

Facilities New concepts, services, products usages of telecommunication infrastructures with specific tools for development, test, evaluation and characterization

Experimentation tools, methods and measures

Methodology Distributed network and services infrastructure between PACA region and Monaco

Components and partial networks hosted by partners and 2 Experimentation and Demonstration Centers (Sophia Antipolis, Marseille)

National and regional access for industry, research, learning. Shared or exclusive access

Pay per day with adaptable cost according to : • Type of users : SMEs, national or international users, PRIDES memberr • Period of use : 1-5 days, 6-20, 21-40, > 40 • Numbers of technological or services clusters involved • Annual subscription

More information Available on request

3.3 HEALTH

CNR - SDA

CNR-SDA Centre National de Référence-Santé à Domicile et Autonomie

(National Reference Center for Autonomy and Home living)

Local founding members: Nice Hospital, SCS Cluster Local research partners: Inria and CSTB

Objective The CNR was created by the French ministry of Economy in late 2009 to foster the use of ICT for supportive community living. Its vocation is to create and promote new usages of technologies (ITC) and associated services in the support of health and dependence at home in order to : • Increase quality of life for citizens and patients • Facilitate the emergence of more efficient organizations. • Expand the economic competitiveness of ITC in health industry.

Facilities CNR-SDA wants to become the agency "facilitator" to provoke collective innovation:

• Users (citizens, health and medico-social professionals, groups, associations).

• Solution providers and services. • Funders. • Academics and experts. • Actors of economic development (competitiveness cluster and clusters).

Available support : • Technical and economical watch • Information and communication • Training • Expertise and support

Methodology Membership on demand

More information http://www.cnr-sante.fr/, http://www.cnr-sante.fr/nos-services/

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 21 (143)



CIU santé

CIU Santé SCS Cluster

Centre Innovation et Usages (Center for Innovation and Usage for Health)

Objective The center is dedicated to health professional who want to design, experiment and assess new technological solutions for health in the domain of “Gerontechnology and Telemedecine”

Facilities Innovation lab. This laboratory aims to foster innovation through meetings between various stakeholders: industrial, academic, doctors, patients …). It offers technical watch services and players cartography. Integration Iab. In this laboratory innovative technological solutions are experimented in real settings to get valuable data concerning use of the innovation Evaluation and standardization center. This center evaluates solutions coming from industry following rigorous scientific and medical methodologies and protocols, measuring statistical validity, standard conformity. It also provides recommendations for the best use of the solutions . Valorization center. This centre promotes the use innovative technological solutions in the health domain.

The Innovation lab helps setting up innovation projects which are instantiated in the integration lab. Innovative solutions are experimented with patients on several platforms’ environment. Results are processed by the evaluation center and, when validated, are transmitted to the valorization center.

The lab is benefiting from medical expertise, hospital environment combined with technical and project management expertise.

More information http://www.pole-scs.org/les-services-du-p%C3%B4le/centres-et-pf-mutualis%C3%A9s/ciu-sante

3.4 EDUCATION

Sophi@STIC Campus

Sophi@STIC Eurecom Institut, Inria, Nice-Sophia Antipolis University (Founders)

Objective Sophi@STIC is a huge Campus (14 ha – 22000 square meters) edicated to STIC with a funding from General Council of Alpes-Maritimes, PACA Regional Council and French Government. There are 4 axes :

• Bio-health. Models of biological systems at different scales with applications on personalized therapeutic recommendations , care tracking, gerontology

• Environment and sustainable development • Ubiquitous systems and networks. Communication, calculus and

software • Networked Knowledge, Services and Usages . Transversal topic

across other the three others thematic

Facilities Several physical sites, Shared technological platforms

Relationships with industries and SME

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 22 (143)



(continued)

Sophi@STIC Eurecom Institut, Inria, Nice-Sophia Antipolis University (Founders)

Methodology Research

Based on excellence of research teams already present, the cluster has the ability to group on projects identified forces from different partners to help build an integrated and scalable on a combination of scientific and technical thematic original at UE level.

Transfer

The transfer must be understood in its broadest: from knowledge transfer to technical transfer. By its ability to develop innovative technologies, the cluster has an important role to play on the training trainers. By its ability to federate the different team partners, the cluster can offer a unique and tailored assistance for the purposes of industrial partners interested in developing new products based on research results. Particular attention will be exercised to attract the innovative SMEs and their networking.

Education

Based on the excellence of its research topics and fed by its interactions from the transfer, the cluster has the ability to control at the highest level of academic work to build and to harmonize training for the growing of international curriculum based on educational innovation at Masters, engineer and PhD, around a multidisciplinary approach and in connection with the best training facilities at international level. Site players position themselves in the logic of Lisbon declaration and building the knowledge economy the most globally competitive. The courses offered on campus are intended to accommodate participants and stakeholders at the highest international level because of their innovations both on the multidisciplinary flap and on the originality of developed approaches and teaching methods.

Animation

Home and organization of scientific and technical events international level. The site of Sophia-Antipolis and more generally that of Côte d’Azur, has a power of attraction which must be used and valued in order to allow the development of scientific meetings and technical journals in the agenda of major international conferences. Similarly, special care must be worn on the organization of a communication to the general public to associate the site to its immediate environment through a particular activity explicit scientific culture. Finally, the ambition is also to provide a permanent space for contact and exhibition to promote the employability of students and linking with business.

More information http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sophia_Antipolis#Campus_STIC

EIT Kic “ICT Labs”

Sophia Node of EIT KIC “ICT Labs”

European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT)

ICT Knowledge and Innovation Communities

Objective The European Institute of Innovation and Technology was legally established in 2008 by the European Commission as an independent institute within the EU. EIT aims at being the catalyst for a step change in the European Community's innovation capacity and impact. The EIT funded Knowledge and Innovation Communities (KICs) and the first ones were fully operational in December 2010

Among them, EIT KIC “ICT Labs” is a new initiative intended to turn Europe into the global leader in ICT innovation. It is the catalyst for significant ICT innovation, integrating Education, Research and Business. It aims to fulfill this mission by establishing a new type of partnership between leading companies, research centers, and universities in Europe.

EIT KIC “ICT Labs” operates from Co-location Centers (CLCs) in 5 main nodes : Helsinki, Stockholm, Eindhoven, Paris, Berlin

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 23 (143)



In France :

The six core partners are: INRIA (National Institute for Research in Computer Science and Control), Alcatel-Lucent, Orange-France Telecom, Pierre et Marie Curie University, Paris-Sud University and Institut Telecom. 7 affiliated partners have been identified among which three are located in Sophia Antipolis. This "Sophia node" which will be hosted in the Sophi@STIC Campus involves Inria, SCS cluster and University of Sophia Antipolis.

Among the 6 thematic action lines defined, "Digital Cities of the Future" will improve the living conditions for citizens in large urban conglomerations via ICT enabled solutions in the areas of security, pollution, transportation, and resource management (e.g. water).

Three innovation actions lines including facilities have been defined

Education action lines Master school Doctoral school Post-doc program Outreach program

Research action lines

Below are some of the research action lines :

Computing in the Cloud <http://eit.ictlabs.eu/action-lines/research-action-lines/computing-in-the-cloud/> which is an emerging computing paradigm where applications, data and infrastructures are provided as a service that can be ubiquitously accessed from any connected devices over the Internet, Internet technologies and architecture <http://eit.ictlabs.eu/action-lines/internet-technologies-and-architecture/> to foster the development of new communication technologies and networking architectures (IP networks over simple, super-fast optical core networks, wireless networking, new networking architectures with tremendously massive performance and reliability as well as energy-efficiency) ICT-mediated Human activity <http://eit.ictlabs.eu/action-lines/research-action-lines/ict-mediated-human-activity/> for multimodal and embodied interaction, augmented and mixed reality, interaction with mirror worlds, and through intelligent information and media access.

Digital Cities of the Future < http://eit.ictlabs.eu/action-lines/digital-cities-of-the-future/>

Business action lines Market and consumer insights Co-located innovation New business creation Innovation in established Companies

Facilities In EIT KIC “ICT labs” facilities are called Innovation catalysts and are associated with each action lines.

• Education catalysts goes from Innovation & Entrepreneurship learning Modules to Industrial Doctoral training center

• Research catalysts includes between others, thematic workshops testbeds, living labs and mobility programs

• Business catalysts start from entrepreneurship support systems and innovation radar up technology transfer program

http://eit.ictlabs.eu/innovation-catalysts/

More information EIT : http://eit.europa.eu/fileadmin/Content/Downloads/PDF/Background_Information/EIT_Presentation_for_web-site_20110208.pdf

EIT KIC “ICT Labs” : http://eit.ictlabs.eu/

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 24 (143)



3.5 SMART CITY

NCA has several actions towards smart cities: • City of Tomorrow is a huge project of building a new hightech district with a state

funding. • Smarter City Challenge is organized by IBM. NCA won this challenge and will benefit of

IBM experts supports to study requirements of a complex multimodal transportation node.

• NCA numerical ecosystem is a Pacalabs project under study that will provide a complete overview of current assets and clear roadmap towards a numerical ecosystem.

CityZi

CityZi Nice city council

Objective Provide to resident with NFCphones to access realtime information and pay public services and shopping articles when customer of affiliated banks

The project bring together several banks, mobile operators, and a public transport operator to test on a large scale the use of mobile phones for usual daily payment.

Announced in June 2009: The Nice city council has won funding from the French government to become the 'city of reference' for a 'pre-commercial' NFC test

Launched officially in May 2010: ”The city of Nice, France, has launched "Nice, mobile contactless city", the first commercial contactless mobile service in Europe””

Coordinator Association Française pour le Sans Contact Mobile (AFSCM),

Partners: City of Nice, University of Nice Sophia Antipolis (UNSA), 3 operators (Bouygues Telecom , Orange, SFR), NCA public transportation operator (Veolia), French banks (Credit Mutuel, Société générale, BNP Paribas) May 2011: To begin with, from the Spring of 2010, 3,000 residents will be able to pay for tram and bus tickets and get information on routes and times using NFC phones. Additional NFC-based services are also due to be available at local museums, cultural events and on the campus of UNSA. The service will be marketed under the Cityzi brand name. (NFC will not be used in the future).The new brand name for NFC services in France.

Facilities Payments. Consumers who purchase an NFC phone will be able to make payments at any merchant equipped to handle contactless payments. Transport. Purchase of transport tickets and access to real-time travel information for all services calling at each bus and tram departure point in the Nice region via 1,500 NFC and 2D barcode-enabled information points being installed across the local transport network. As well as travel information, the information points will also provide access to information services provided by the city council, events listings and the latest news articles from Nice Matin, the region's daily newspaper. Information services. As well as the travel services, additional information services will be available, including an NFC tag-based tour of the old city of Nice. Loyalty points. Consumers will be able to collect loyalty points automatically when they use their NFC phone to make a purchase.

Services Transportation: Bus and tram paying / bying tickets + route and time information

Tourism: multimedia information on cityZi target during museum or city visit (historical monuments)

Shopping: Paying with mobile phone in shop affiliated

Campus of the university of Sophia Antipolis

More information http://www.cityzi.fr/

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 25 (143)



Ecocité

Ecocité NCA

Objective The eco-city project is a first step and is inserted into a larger project of Eco-valley. The ambition of Nice Côte d'Azur is becoming eco-reference area of Southeastern Europe in terms of sustainable urban development. The eco-city City is designed to become a laboratory for sustainable development and the innovation engine of the agglomeration can create a leverage effect on the entire territory.

New eco-friendly urban planning « ecocité du futur ».

West of Nice obtained the EcoCité label by the French government, which was given to only 13 sites in the country

Facilities Project Eco-city Nice Plain Var revolves around four axes :

• Choose a responsible urbanization,

• Create tomorrow's mobility

• Move toward energy independence

• Embody the intelligent city of the future

Many facilities will be provided among which :

Station for reloading electrical vehicles

• 700 reloading stations

• 70 car-sharing stations for electrical vehicles

• Solar parking with photovoltaic panels for power supply of reloading stations

Urban monitoring

• Measure Air & water quality, noise, 02, …

• Use existing light pylon to install sensors and a wireless network

• To provide feed-back to citizen and improve eco-behavior

Methodology Partnership with Innovation clusters, and academic stakeholders

Eco Vallée

Eco Vallée projet NCA

Objective Eco Vallée is a "National interest operation" which covers 10 k hectare. Main Issues of the project are : • High tech experiments • Wellbeeing • Ecobuildings • Sustainable mobility • Energy management • Natural risks

Methodology The project is conducted in 3 steps

• A fist study called national positioning has been conducted by an international architecture agency. The study has framed the project and defined its main development axes.

• In a second step, 3 different international teams have worked on the town planning definition

• Three years later, the operational work has begun. The architect works with three local agencies.

More information http://www.nice.fr/Collectivites/Les-grands-projets/Le-Grand-Arenas

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 26 (143)



3.6 RESEARCH

I-labs System

I-Labs system Inria Sophia Antipolis Méditerranée

Objective In order to boost technology transfers to SMEs and SMIs, INRIA has established the I-Labs system. The idea is to bring together an INRIA project team and a partner SME in a joint laboratory.

Methodology The two entities define a joint, specific work program lasting two to three years. Incentives are given by INRIA to the project team involved, while the SME can receive government assistance to finance its research project (particularly the research tax credit).

Ultimately, the innovation capacity of these SMEs must be reinforced, with an increase in their R&D recruitments and technology transfers.

More information http://en.inria.fr/innovation/inria-smes/i-labs

SME Club

SME Club Inria Sophia Antipolis Méditerranée

Objective Created by INRIA in 2009, the "SME Club" boosts computer technology transfers to innovative SMEs. It also supports these businesses in their growth. Established in 2009 by the institute, this new network gives companies the possibility of being on the front line to take advantage of the innovations of public research.

Methodology A strategy for technology transfers to SMEs

Through a dedicated portal, the SME Club is a true bridge intended to emphasize exchanges and collaborations between SMEs and public research. This network aims to promote innovation, a guarantee of SME development. According to Bruno Sportisse, Director of Technology Transfer and Innovation at INRIA, the Club represents "an excellent vehicle for maximizing the impact of the research conducted within our centers. By revitalizing our exchanges with our partner SMEs, we benefit from their market experience. We are then able to adapt our technology transfer offering in order to support them in their growth."

Personalized access for SMEs

Any innovative SME in the field of ICST, through it offering or its market, is invited to join the SME Club. Businesses have personalized access to the dedicated Web portal. They thus benefit from information allowing them to fit into the overall dynamics of the players of innovation alongside INRIA, such as:

• technology transfer opportunities, regardless of the vehicle in question; • calls for collaborative research proposals (Europe, ANR, FUI) in which they

can be involved alongside INRIA project teams; • the presentation of national and international actions of INRIA capable of

providing opportunities for involvement or promotion; • CVs of young graduates and engineers who have gained experience within

INRIA.

INRIA also guarantees an individualized relationship with its SME partners through personalized meetings with its partnership and innovation project managers at each of its centers. At the same time, a nationwide dynamic will be implemented through annual meetings offered to all of the members.

Reinforcing the competitiveness of the French and European economy

With this club, the Institute comes even closer to innovative SMEs. The creation of the "INRIA partner SME Club" responds to a priority set by the Institute: strengthen technology transfers to innovative SMEs, recognized as being an essential element of the competitiveness of the French and European economy.

More information http://en.inria.fr/innovation/inria-smes/sme-club

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 27 (143)



Gouraud-Phong Immersive Space

Gouraud-Phong Immersive Space

Inria Sophia Antipolis Méditerranée – CPER Telius

Objective For a long time virtual reality has represented one of the major areas of research at the INRIA Sophia Antipolis–Méditerranée centre. In order to build on its capacities within this field with equipment that is at the cutting edge of international research, the Centre had been equipped itself with an original, highly effective immersive room.

Facilities Ispace

Immersive cube

Cadwall Image wall which offers high quality visual rendering in relief (stereo), a spatialized sound reproduction and the position monitoring of different targets or optical markers.

It is also possible to be directly connected to a PC room, thus benefiting from a significant computing power in order to couple high-performance computing with visualization and interaction, and obtain a higher-performing generation of sounds or images.

Methodology This pooled research platform will enable researchers from the Institute and their european, regional, academic or industrial partners to test their software or view their data in 3D.

More information http://en.inria.fr/news/mediacentre/gouraud-phong-platform

ProActive Paca Grid

ProActive Paca Grid

Inria Sophia Antipolis Méditerranée - CPER telius

Objective ProActive PACA Grid is a set of machines accessible via Graphical Interactive interfaces based on ProActive Parallel Suite The machines are currently deployed within INRIA Sophia Antipolis networks. The Cloud aggregates dedicated machines, both Linux and Windows, and spare desktop machines, dynamically added during nights and week-ends.

Facilities Tutorial

Direct access

Software

• Matlab 2007

• Blender 2.46

http://proactive.inria.fr/pacagrid/pacagrid-cluster

Methodology This Grid is available for INRIA and UNSA members that need to accelerate their scientific applications. Upon request, other PACA labs and SMEs can also access the ProActive PACA Grid.

More information http://proactive.inria.fr

http://proactive.inria.fr/pacagrid/

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 28 (143)



3.7 LIVING LAB AND USER COMMUNITIES

ICT Usage Lab

Following the "Laboratoire des Usages" of Sophia Antipolis which was a Scientific Interest Group between academic and industrial partners (2000-2006), the ICT Usage Labs got his label from ENoLL in July 2006 and became the first Living Lab in France. It was restructured in 2008 by four creating members: CSTB (Centre Scientifique et Technique du Bâtiment), INRIA, Orange Labs and University of Sophia Antipolis (UNSA). Gathering territories, SMEs, users communities and research teams dedicated to the use of ICT and innovation, the cluster develops through its projects a Living Lab approach to co-design of new products and services with users and to usage data analysis. ICT Usage Lab is one of the creating members of the European Network of Living Labs (ENoLL) Association.

GERHOME– CSTB - ICT USAGE LAB

Gerhome CSTB - ICT Usage lab

Objective The objective of GERHOME project is to develop, try out and certify technical solutions supporting the assistance services for enhancing independence of the elderly at home, by using intelligent technologies for house automations to ensure autonomy, comfort of life, security, monitoring and assistance to place of residence.

One of the main concerns of this project is to make technology “invisible”.

These services will allow:

• to reduce the risks of accidents at home (risks of falls, burns, etc) and other risks (heat wave, etc)

• to keep the bond with the members of the family, the entourage, the doctor

• to adapt the habitat in order to follow and preserve the autonomy of the growing old people

• to offer some other services such as the medical follow-up (drugs absorption, real-time monitoring, etc), the management of the urgency, and the assistance to place of residence.

Facilities Corridor : with an electric socket near the entrance door Main room : • kitchenette (with work-top, sink, burning, fridge) • Wall mounted electrical heater • A window and a door with external access • 4 electrical sockets (230 volts), one in each corner • A Ceilling light with switch Bedroom : • Window and door • Wall mounted electrical heater • 2 electrical sockets (230 volts) in the corners • A Ceilling light with switch Bathroom : • Shower cabin • Shower rose • Bathroom sink • Faucet • 1 electrical socket (230 volts) • A Ceilling light with switch • Wall mounted electrical heate • A door

Methodology Participants in experiments are selected according to predefined profiles and they spent a few hours (1 day max)

User experience is recorded

In a second phase, the project will instrument real physical spaces

More information http://gerhome.cstb.fr/en/home/introduction.html

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 29 (143)



User communities

Various user communities are involved via citizens associations as (CODERPA, Femmes 3000,…).

ERIC SITES

ERIC sites PACA Region

Espace Regional Internet Citoyen - Regional Internet Space for Citizen

Objective An ERIC is a free open space for citizen to access web and computers.

It is linked to a Regional program

Facilities An ERIC is a proximity space with a specific ERIC label where people from the neighborhood can come to participate to thematic debate, use

The services provided are free or have a low fee.

There is 2 ERIC in NICE

• Le Hublot

• CYBER-EMPLOI e NICE (ville de Nice)

More information http://www.lehublot.net

Town Cyber space

Town Cyber space City hall

Objective Town cyber space are cultural space managed b y the City Hall They aim to provide citizen with a web access.

Facilities A town cyberspace is a proximity space where people from the neighborhood can come to participate to thematic debate, and use high tech devices

The service provided are free or have a low fee

There is currently 3 cyber space in NICE :

• Cyber Espace "Cœur-de-Ville

• Cyber Espace "Nord-Centre-Ville"

• Cyber Espace "Rives-du-Paillon"

Nice District councils

District Councils Nice City hall

Objective District councils are clusters of district inhabitants which allow them to participate the management of the city (within their area). Seventeen district councils represent the diversity of the neighborhood.

Facilities Functionning funds

Methodology The Mayor may consult on issues concerning their neighborhoods or throughout the city and involve them in the development, implementation and evaluation of actions promoting the good life together.

District councils are a source of ideas and opinions on topics of general interest, to make public action more effective in improving the living environment of the citizens.

More information http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conseil_de_quartier

http://www.nice.fr/Proximite/Conseils-de-quartiers

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 30 (143)



3.8 ENABLERS

Innovation clusters

Innovation clusters are ecosystems bringing together on a territory various stakeholders. Their objective is to mutualize resources and to foster cooperation and partnership on innovation projects

Clusters are world class or national class.

In Paca region there is 9 innovation clusters among which the world class cluster SCS, dedicated to the whole value chain of ICT (from silicium to use).

SCS INNOVATION CLUSTER

SCS Innovation cluster

Solutions Communicantes sécurisées

PRIDES

Objective The SCS cluster is world class cluster dedicated to the whole value chain of ICT (from silicium to use). It has more than 260 subscribers.

The SCS cluster goals are

• To set up innovative collaborative R & D projects • Create a well suited ecosystem for a regional ICT development • Contribute in SMEs growth and development (SMEs are for 70% of SCS

subscribers).

Facilities Label

The cluster accords a label "innovative enterprise" which improves visibility and credibility, financial benefits, access to funding …

Expertise center

• CNRFID • CIU santé

R&D Platforms

• CIM PACA • Paca mobile center

Thematic working group

• Identity • Traceability • Mobility • Connectivity • Security

Support for SMEs

• Business plan • international development plan • Business mapping

Methodology To become a member, an enterprise has to subscribe and can become :

• Active member if it is established in PACA region and involved in a cluster project (at least)

• Associated member if it is established in PACA region and not involved in a cluster project or not established in PACA region

Project submission for labeling

• To be submitted a new project has to be in line with the thematic of the cluster and regroup at least 2 enterprises and an academic partner.

More information http://www.pole-scs.org/frontpage

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 31 (143)



ICI INNOVATION CLUSTER

ICI Innovation Cluster

PRIDES

Industries de créativité et d'Innovation

Creativity and Innovation industries

Objective The PRIDES ICI is a network of universities, research laboratories, designers and artists with a focus on people in their numerical environment. Main topics are :

• new marketing (ludo-marketing, interactive and participative marketing • spaces to live and to work in • publicity event • information and training broadcasting

Facilities Blog

Rings : meeting crossing

Support to innovative project

Methodology The association aims cluster ICI to play the role :

• a platform for exchange and networking of different actors with projects in the thematic,

• to play a unifying role between these actors from worlds as diverse as those of the industrial, academic research in the humanities, applied sciences, and sciences, artistic creation and the events,

• to provide training, business intelligence, business intelligence, help in setting up projects on behalf of its members,

• to promote with partners outside the region Provence Alpes Cote d'Azur regional sector industries of cultural creativity in leading projects including conducting international cooperation projects and borders.

All have the power to vote at the General Assembly, subject to update their subscription.

More information http://www.lerondpointdici.org/resources/P$C3$B4le+ICI+en+1+page.pdf

http://lerondpointdici.fr/__oneclick_uploads/2008/10/pole-ici-en-5-pages.pdf

http://www.lerondpointdici.org/index.html

CAP ENERGY INNOVATION CLUSTER

Cap energy

Innovation cluster

Cap energy Innovation cluster

PRIDES

Objective The pole Capenergie together 400 stakeholders from industry, research and training of the PACA region, Corsica, Guadeloupe, Reunion and the Principality of Monaco.

Facilities Capenergies positioned itself on the development and deployment of energy systems to provide real solutions necessary to replace fossil fuels. These energy systems of the future, based on needs assessments and energy resources of each territory, will be integrating various solutions corresponding:

• to control energy demand in buildings, equipment, industry and transport, • to primary energy renewable, • to primary energy nuclear, • architectures for local energy spread in the territories, • dynamic management of supply and demand.

More information http://www.capenergies.fr/index.php?Accueil

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 32 (143)



High tech Sophia Antipolis SMEs, foundation and association • Telecom valley : http://www.telecom-valley.fr/ • Fondation Sophia Antipolis : http://www.sophia-antipolis.org/

Incubators, Thinktanks and valorization organization • ValorPaca: , shared device for transfer of technology for six universities

http://www.valorpaca.fr/ • Paca Est Incubator: http://www.incubateurpacaest.org/Incubateur/L-incubateur-Paca-Est • see also a shared communication platform for Paca Est and Paca Ouest incubators :

http://www.incubateurs-paca.com/accueil/index.php • Fing : http://fing.org/

3.9 REGIONAL ASSETS

The PACA region has : • 9 competitivity clusters (six of which have the PRIDES’s label) • 29 enterprises networks (PRIDES) • 1 grant for SME innovation with a living lab approach (Pacalab) • A partnership with a Thinktank (FING) • An explicit strategy to foster innovation (SRI) • Set up an assessment of SME • 4 axes : foster cooperation interclusters, support r&d platforms, creative economy,

sustainable Méditerranée

Regional assets for innovation

Regional

assets

Paca Region

Provence Cote d'Azur Region

Objective Foster development of ICT Usage by all stakeholders (collectivies

Facilities SRI - Regional Strategy for Innovation http://www.regionpaca.fr/uploads/media/Pour_une_strategie__regionale_d_Innovation-efficiente.pdf

RRI –Regional Innovation Network

Created in 2007, the network is composed of 4000 enterprises

Cartography at :

http://www.pacainnovation.com/index.php?id=59#Reseauregionaldelinnovation

Prides – Enterprise network

PRIDES are enterprise networks that link specific industrial competencies with common innovation targets and solidarity goals

Regional council provides funding for PRIDES projects

29 PRIDES (among which 9 clusters)

http://www.regionpaca.fr/index.php?id=3115

http://www.regionpaca.fr/index.php?id=3113

Innovation portal

On line access to structured information about innovation: partnerships, fundings.

http://www.pacainnovation.com/

Reperes network

Network of enterprise zone in the south, created in 2009

https://sites.google.com/a/reperes.pro/reperes-paca/

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 33 (143)



ERIC program (see below)

Paca labs program (see below)

Numerical territories program

The Territoires Numériques program has been initiated in 2004 by the Regional Council of PACA (with a FEDER funding) to support territories in designing their s ICT strategy and contribute in project funding :

• Economic development

• Tourism

• Distant learning

Alternatives Local Loops Le programme « Boucles locales alternatives » a pour objectif d’accompagner en ingénierie des territoires de projets sur leur stratégie haut débit et aider au financement de projets de déploiement de « technologies alternatives » haut débit dans les zones non couvertes par l’ADSL.

Competitiveness clusters

• SCS (PRIDES) http://www.pole-scs.org/ • CapEnergies (PRIDES) http://www.capenergies.fr/ • Pegase (PRIDES) http://www.pole-pegase.com/ • Risques (PRIDES) http://www.pole-risques.com/en • Trimatec http://www.pole-trimatec.fr/ • PEIFL http://www.peifl.org/v2/public/ • PASS (PRIDES) http://www.pole-pass.fr/ • Mer Paca (PRIDES) http://www.polemerpaca.com/ • Pop Sude / Optitec http://www.popsud.org/

Regional Council Programs

ERIC PROGRAM

ERIC program PACA Region

Espace Regional Internet Citoyen - Regional Internet Space for Citizen

Objective The ERIC program has been initiated in 2001 by the Regional Council of PACA (with a FEDER funding) to reduce the digital divide. An ERIC is a free open space for citizen to access web and computers.

Current objective : to foster creativity through the advanced use of multimedia devices and to provide to various users (collectivities, associations, ..)

Facilities Physical space

There is now about 150 sites labelled ERIC on the PACA territory. Each space has its own equipments and objectives (from basic training of computer usage to advanced use of multimedia devices for creativity projects)

There are 2 ERIC sites in NICE

An on line platform providing access to resources for numerical territory ecosystems is available

Methodology Professional associations and other Citizen clusters can submit to obtain the ERIC label. If accepted they can get financial support from the regional council, have help to set up projects and submit them for additional funding.

More information On line platform (http://eric.regionpaca.fr/index.php3)

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 34 (143)



PACALABS FUNDING

PACA Labs PACA Regional Council

Objective Paca Labs is a regional program to foster user centered open innovation

A regional pilot Program launched by the PACA Region in 2008 (- 2013) Fundings : Region and EFRD 2007-2013

Objectives : • To give SME the opportunities for tests, experimentations and fields for «

proof of concept » with communities of users in real life • To foster open innovation and cross-fertilization through collaborative

projects • To give an active role for the territories (« smart territories/communities ») • To give a regional framework for local « living labs » initiatives and link

them to clusters

Facilities 1M€/year to support innovative projects

Three kinds of projects are supported :

• Real life prototyping, • Testing before market launch • Open innovation

Methodology Set-up of a collaborative project with territory and users involvement

Project submission

Project review by regional council

If selected, project review by territory authorities

If selected , funding agreement by FEDER

More information http://www.regionpaca.fr/recherche-tic/les-territoires-dans-une-demarche-numerique.html

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 35 (143)



4 HELSINKI COMMON ASSETS CASE STUDY This case study focuses on information navigation in the city and the use of Open Data. The case is contributed by partner City of Helsinki with Forum Virium.

Authors: Kim Viljanen, Annti Poikola, Pekka Koponen.

Interviews

In order to establish how Helsinki works, we interviewed employees in the public sector and other members of the urban community. We are indebted to our interviewees and other providers of comments.

• Pekka Sauri, Deputy Mayor in charge of Public Works and Environmental Affairs, City of Helsinki

• Markku Raitio, IT Director, City of Helsinki

• Ari Andersin, Project Manager, Enterprise Architecture, City of Helsinki

• Mirjam Heikkinen, Project Manager, Facility Register and Service Map, City of Helsinki

• Matti Nikupeteri, Engineer, Building Regulation Department, Urban Landscape Unit, City of Helsinki

• Otso Kivekäs, Member of the Public Works Committee, City of Helsinki

• Jaakko Lehtonen, Dodo ry, for an eco-efficient city

• Pirjo Tulikukka, Executive Director, Helsinki Neighbourhoods Association

• Teppo Moisio, Reporter, Helsingin Sanomat

• Petri Aukia, Managing Director, Codento Oy

Acknowledgments:

Auli Aalto, Anu Heinonen, Ville Meloni, Iina Oilinki, Matti Ollinkari, Jussi Pajunen, Heli Rantanen, Pekka Timonen

Foreword

Mayor Jussi Pajunen, City of Helsinki

The model of local democracy as we know it today is undergoing a fundamental transformation which will shake the foundations of our society. In a way, we are actually returning to the origins of the rule of the people; to the Greek and Roman city states, where informed members of the communities gathered to debate and decide on important matters.

For centuries we have distanced ourselves from this ideal. This development has, of course, occurred as a very natural consequence of the evolvement of the everyday lives and obligations of citizens. It would not be very practical to summon all the Helsinkians to the Senate Square to decide about the next year’s budget.

Nevertheless, we now have the tools to do this virtually. In terms of city operations, the breakthrough of ICT has probably led to the greatest change in our way to work ever. However, until now ICT has been mostly perceived as a convenient tool just to carry out the duties as before. What I mean is that ICT has been glued on the existing structure, without reflecting on how it should be changed as a result of the new available technology. Only now are we entering a phase where computers and applications are really changing the ways we work. This is what I understand defines a Smart City – a whole new approach and level

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 36 (143)



of ambition in combining information, communication and technology.

At present, we have an abundance of digital sources available just by a mouse-click, not to mention public libraries and other information services. Though, we still face several challenges in exploiting them in practice. For the average citizen, it requires great efforts to map out available sources and to learn how to access them – not to mention the challenge of processing and interpreting the information.

The norm of the Nordic society model has always been openness. Limitations on disclosure have been an exception and have required an explicit legal basis. Nonetheless, publicity of documents and accessibility to them are by no means congruent terms. Irrelevant of the principle of openness, special efforts have been required to attain official documents. Often this would involve a visit at the registrar’s office of a specific department.

Herein lies the great revolution: information and technology in ICT have previously existed separately. Communication has mostly been one-way, going from the administration to the people.

Thanks to the new way of thinking, it will be possible to easily access virtually all data that may be disclosed as such in digital format. To illustrate my point, I will use the new information management system of Helsinki, Ahjo, as an example. All pending matters are registered and drafted in a citywide database. The different stages in the decision-making process add new information such as reports and statements from officials, departments and committees. Nearing the end of this cycle, there is an extensive amount of information concentrated in one digital system.

Now let us envisage that this information is made available to everyone through a web interface. In my visions all this information will be available to everyone, from the moment when the preparation process is launched within the city. Just imagine the vast opportunities for think tanks and residents’ associations to present their own proposals regarding, for example, a new city planning project or the development of basic services in a certain district and make an important contribution to the official preparation procedure by providing an additional viewpoint. Participatory budgeting is another exciting possibility.

That being said, we are facing not only a groundbreaking paradigm shift in terms of openness, but regarding our entire democratic model and empowerment. It will shake the foundations of our present way of working and the way that we perceive local democracy today.

We have also received encouraging results from new informal forums where the scale of the operation is zoomed in from the local all the way to the district level. Representatives of residents associations, NGO’s, civic activists and politicians come together in order to tackle problems that are common to a certain, limited part of the urban community.

An important question related to openness is the way information is made available. Vast databases are not easily interpreted. Special statistical understanding is required in order to make sense of the information. A great challenge is refining information into a more visual format.

Helsinki Region Infoshare is an exciting initiative that combines openness with visualization. Its main aim is to make regional information quickly and easily accessible to all. The data may be used by citizens, businesses, universities, academies, research facilities or municipal administration at no cost. The data published during the project is mainly statistical, giving a comprehensive and diverse outlook on different urban phenomena, such as living conditions, economics and well-being, employment and transport.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 37 (143)



Behind the project is the vision that making public data readily available to all increases the residents’ knowledge and insight into their region. This in turn improves the civic activity abilities of the public. Open access to information can also lead to new services and businesses in the area, and it may also advance research and development. The idea is also that the city can receive help from active citizens in interpreting the data and understanding the dynamics of the city. In the city strategy we have made a strong commitment to increase the citizen orientation in our welfare services.

In the core of this reasoning lies the vast scope of responsibilities of the Finnish cities, covering everything from basic health care and schools to street maintenance and city planning. This is based on our legislatory framework. What is new is the emergence of a new approach and way of thinking regarding the duties of a municipality; that irrelevant of the responsible authority, everything that is in the interest of the residents is also a part of the extended duties of the city.

Helsinki aims to offer means and methods for ordinary citizens to participate in developing their living environment. Actions and plans do not always have to be huge and momentous. The most important thing is to involve people in the decision-making process that applies to their living area.

Publicly available and understandable information is a prerequisite for a functioning modern democracy. Access to relevant and future oriented information contributes to better decision making and better life in terms of liveable cities, competitiveness and sustainability. Our great challenge is to build mechanisms that now ensure the two-way communication between the citizens and the city and to find ways to support and encourage the civic activity envisaged.

Smart cities pave the way for new local democracy.

4.1 INTRODUCTION

The city, as we understand it, is a concentration of human activity in a physical location and in digital reality.

The physical concentration of habitation, services, business, culture and all kinds of human activities is helpful for the interaction between people. An ever-increasing amount of human activity related to the city is also occurring online, in digital reality. Internet and web add new dimensions to the city, create opportunities free of physical constraints, make borders more diffuse and make the city a part of the digital world. Distance becomes less significant, and people can interact with each other regardless of space and time.

To understand the city you visit, you may look at a map, read a history of the city, talk with local residents or have a coffee while you sit by a square and observe the hustle and bustle. Each of these ways of understanding a city offers its own perspective on it.

Digital data offer a new vantage point on the city as a whole. There is a wealth of data on cities: statistics, publications, simulation models, video recordings, images, maps, geographic information, 3D models. Data can be used to examine the past, visualise the present and anticipate the future. The municipal organisation itself also has vast amounts of data that tell what happens in the city in practice.

Ensuring cities’ level of service provision and cultivating their vitality means that they have to be increasingly agile in meeting both anticipated and unforeseen challenges.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 38 (143)



The concentration of people and functions also causes problems, such as traffic jams, expensive housing and crime. Many European cities also have to grapple with challenges such as aging populations and a scarcity of financial resources. Together with unforeseen future challenges, these require cities to renew themselves constantly and develop their expertise further. There is a worldwide demand for good solutions.

A smart city is one model of thinking for the development of a better city. In this model, the final aim is to improve the quality of municipal services through holistic development of the city. Holistic development concerns structures, processes, visionary leadership, definitions of policy, technology and municipal infrastructure (Nam & Pardo, 2011).

A smart city makes use of the entire human capital of the city community. The more people participate in solving the challenges related to the city, the more comprehensive the selection of ideas and smarter the solutions will become.

At its best, citizen participation produces a more functional city and a smarter administration. It increases both the trust between people and the social capital of the city community. When people are involved in planning, testing and realisation of shared services, they will view the services as their own.

A key factor in participation is a functional dialogue between the municipal organisation and the different actors in the city community. Participation of the city community requires a shared understanding of the city and shared knowledge base. To enable the city community to contribute fully to development of the city, the municipal organisation must make its information available to all.

The divide between municipal organisation and the city community is currently rather acute. Established ways of acting and administrative structures do not always support residents’ participation nor make it possible to take their ideas into account in the functioning of the municipality.

It is also a question of how the city is seen. Is the city a mere service organisation with clients, or is it primarily a community served by the service organisation but having people at its core? People have knowledge, skills and experience that can be used in developing services.

Digital data offer a new, uncharted perspective on Helsinki.

In this report we show what a ‘smart city’ means in Helsinki. Of the different parts of a smart city, we have emphasised resident participation in municipal development and the way the opened-up data accelerate development and facilitate information-based participation.

Information systems and the operations of a city are tightly integrated. Knowing what data and what information systems the city has would help understanding the city. Having clear picture of the city’s information landscape is prerequisite for developing IT based smart solutions.

Until now, nobody has been completely familiar with all the data and information systems that the City of Helsinki has. Therefore as part of this report, we charted the information systems of the city and used the findings to create a visual map – the Helsinki information system map – which offers a new overview to the city. We believe that a similar charting and visualisation would also be of use to many

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 39 (143)



other smart cities.

In addition, we present nine case studies of smartness in Helsinki. As the conclusion, we offer five lessons learned from Helsinki.

The report is based on interviews carried out in the municipal organisation and city community as well as a charting of the city’s information system descriptions.

Welcome to a digital and participatory expedition into Helsinki!

4.2 AN OPEN CITY WITH SMART PEOPLE

“The concept of an Open Helsinki is literal: a city where information, ideas, thoughts and people can move freely without unnecessary, creativity-hampering obstacles.” Jussi Pajunen, Mayor

The context of this report is a ‘smart city’, ‘smart citizens’ and open data. The following is a description of how Helsinki and this report approaches these themes.

The dynamics of a ‘smart city’

Helsinki views itself as a “smart city” where the “smartness” is first and foremost based on the smartness of the people of the urban community. With the help of the smart people participating in the developing of the city, smart services and operating practices can be created. Key enablers for participation are the openness, the transparency of activities, the distribution of information and the receptiveness of the municipal organisation. These ideas about how a city should be organized is also some of the major reasons why Helsinki was selected as the World Design Capital with the vision of “Open Helsinki - Embedding design in Life”.

Deputy mayor Pekka Sauri explains how Helsinki approaches ‘smartness’ as follows:

1) A smart city can combine service production and an innovative environment

The city is a service organisation, which produces dependable, predictable, reliable and efficient services. At the same time, the city should be an environment where creative activity and innovations are possible. The city should allow an adequate degree of freedom or directly encourage such innovation, combining it with risk-free service production. Reliability and security – creativity and risk-taking.

2) A smart city exploits available information

In its activities, the city should take into account all available information about the state of the world and mankind. All information is inevitably produced by people, that is to say, the urban community directly or others. Information may be objective or subjective. The planning of a service production system is based on objective information that is argued in the best possible way. In creating and supporting communities, there is often a need to take account of empirical information. Scientific information has merely gone through a more stringent process of argumentation than empirical information, which may be completely subjective.

3) A smart city means dialogue

The only information available for urban development is that produced by people directly involved in it or that which is produced when people talk about amongst themselves. Those ideas which do not directly relate to this field of communication are excluded.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 40 (143)



Because a municipal organisation cannot own all the wisdom that exists in an urban community, dialogue is needed between the municipality and the urban community. In this dialogue, the community is given as much intellectual material as possible that the municipal organisation has at its disposal. At the same time, the city ensures that it can accept into its own activities those ideas that have come from this extended field of communication. At its best, this dialogue forms a thread of positive learning.

If this field of communication across the urban community – or even global community – can be made available for the development of the city’s activities, then that is the optimal situation. There is nothing other than what people produce and discuss amongst themselves. The key question is how can this communication be organised.

4) A smart city is an urban community

If the city is interpreted merely as a service delivery organisation, then the organisation is in power and the role of its citizens is easily reduced to that of “complaining customer” and passive citizen. In that case, the organisation decides what the residents may do and what they may not. At the same time, the citizens outsource community spirit to the authorities.

Instead, if the city is perceived as a community consisting of communication and interaction between citizens in whose service the service organisation exists, the citizens’ degree of freedom increases and they are more open to experiment with new things, which in turn create innovations. This also benefits the service delivery organisation, which is then defined more by the ideas of the community – in interaction. In a smart city, the city’s service delivery organisation is at the service of the community.

Case 1: World Design Capital: Helsinki 2012 - Open Helsinki

The history of Finnish design is long and highly respected. It can justifiably be said that design is a key part of the Finnish way of life. We respect traditions and cherish the past, but for us design above all represents the future.

In 2012, Helsinki is the World Design Capital (WDC) together with Espoo, Vantaa, Kauniainen and Lahti. The theme of the WDC year is ‘Open Helsinki – Embedding Design in Life’. In an open city, people listen to the city and the city listens to the people. The theme “Open Helsinki” was selected to both represent current views in Finland on how to create a participatory, vibrant and evolving city, but also as an vision on what to improve even further.

The WDC year consists of many different kinds of public events both in Finland and abroad. The intention is not, however, to be a festival of fireworks lasting 365 days, but a project that considers the new role of sustainable design from a broader perspective, and one whose influence will extend far into the future. So

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 41 (143)



what is essential is not what happens in autumn 2012, but what happens in spring 2021.

Perhaps more than anything, Helsinki as the WDC wants to stimulate discussion on how design can make life better, easier and more efficient. Anwers to this question is searched through the various programmes and projects of the year. Design exists for people.

World Design Capital status promotes and supports the cultural, social and economic exploitation of design. It is held every second year and the International Council of Societies of Industrial Design (Icsid) appoints the host city.

http://wdchelsinki2012.fi

That’s right. The people of Helsinki want to take part!

The views of the city’s administration presented above correspond to what has recently happened in Helsinki in practice. Citizens want to take practical action to develop this city and their own living environment. They find traditional methods of democracy less interesting.

The Finnish interest for elections and voting has been gradually declining over a long period. In the same way, interest in participating in traditional civic organisations, movements and parties has also declined. At the same time, it seems that there has been an increase in all kinds of activity in which people themselves can seize the opportunity to promote the general good or oppose things they see as wrong. Participation in social activity has not disappeared but is changing its form.

Citizens are developing new forms of participation and collaboration at a rapid pace. Examples include the Kallio Movement and Restaurant Day. The Kallio Movement was born to oppose the removal of the charitable Hursti bread queues from the Kallio district of Helsinki. Since then, this popular movement that sprung up in social media has organised block parties and other events.

Restaurant Day started as a rebellion against bureaucratic regulation and as an advocate for food culture. The movement started as a reaction to several reports in Helsinki of small kiosks and restaurants being fined or even closed down because of health and other regulations. The city's actions in these cases were generally considered excessive. City officials could also have banned Restaurant Day for reasons of the lack of food-related hygiene, distribution and other licences. The officials, however, decided not to interfere. This event is now seen as an excellent example of the flexible attitude of officials toward activity situated in the ‘grey area’ of acts and decrees, and as an example of something worthwhile that stimulates urban culture and the development of the policies and practices of the city. The Restaurant Day phenomenon has now spread from Helsinki to dozens of other cities around the world.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 42 (143)



Pictured: Kääntöpöytä, one of the pop-up restaurants on Restaurant Day (source: Maria Nordlund dodo.org 2011)

Case 2: Restaurant Day “The municipality should learn from Restaurant Day.”- Mayor Jussi Pajunen

Restaurant Day is a culinary carnival that takes place four times a year to promote food and urban culture. The purpose of the event, which originates from Helsinki, is to encourage people to set up their own restaurants for just one day. People can let their imaginations run wild! They can set up a café, restaurant, kiosk, street kitchen or other ingenious food establishment in their own home if they so choose. Other popular venues have been parks, offices, beaches and courtyards. There have also been a Bicycle Bar and Bread Car, which have brought delights to diners.

Official licences for the restaurants are not requested, and the authorities do not enforce them. The municipality has understood that it must stand aside when citizens occupy space in a completely new way and make Helsinki a nicer place to live and spend time.

On the first Restaurant Day on 21 May 2011, almost 40 pop-up restaurants sprang up in 13 different cities. On the next Restaurant Day in August 2011, about 200 restaurants opened their doors in 30 cities in four different countries. The figures for the last one held in February 2012 were more than 300 restaurants in 50 cities in 12 countries.

The key to Restaurant day is doing things together, enjoying it and having fun! At the same time, the Restaurant day has fostered discussion on how to improve regulation and city policies to enable a more vibrant city.

http://www.restaurantday.org

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 43 (143)



What these new forms of making a difference have in common is that people would rather do things for themselves than trust in the operations of large corporations, organisations or representative democracy. Civic activity is increasingly taking place in communities and networks without any formal organisation. Things get going quickly and may also fade or change into something else once the original aim has been achieved.

One key influential factor in this development is the internet which enables the provision of resources, mobilisation and organisation on a scale that was previously only possible through major organisations. Traditional organisations are also adopting the new approaches and taking advantage of the opportunities presented by the development of information and communication technology.

The new forms of civic activity affects also how people want to participate in the decision-making of their own city. Participation in democracy not only means voting in elections and commenting on the efficiency of public services. Democracy increasingly also means people being active themselves.

Active democracy means getting down to work, if necessary bypassing all the established structures when people feel that something needs to be changed. People now have the possibility to do this as they are better educated than ever before, they have more and more free time and the internet as an effective means of participation.

Participation in active democracy produces more direct results and not just demands for someone else to do something. It is no longer assumed that public authorities can solve all problems, as the potential of the public sector is limited. At the same time, top-down power is losing its significance as people are increasingly preferring to trust their peers. In addition, the activities of the people can lead to changes in the policies of the city - actions as a form of discussion in addition to the direct benefits of the actions.

Also the city can harness the eagerness of the citizens to participate by enabling an open dialog between the citizens and the city. One example of such activity in Helsinki is the Tell-on-the-Map service which has attracted thousands of people to comment on several development topics such as new tram line plans.

Case 3: Tell-on-the-Map - enabling an open dialog between citizens and the city Tell-on-the-Map (Kerro kartalla) is a map-based commentary tool for citizens. It includes flexible and easy-to-use web tools which the civil servants and planners

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 44 (143)



can use in designing and publishing many kinds of open questionnaires that combine maps, geographic information and discussion forums. The tool can be used in planning consultations, gathering local data from the area, local SWOT analyses, safety mapping and gathering ideas and suggestions. Alternative plans and drafts can be commented.

The user can put a comment on the map and also view what others have said as all comments and civil servants' answers can be read, searched and discussed further. The application produces categorized data that can be analyzed, refined and combined with other data in GIS programs and Excel. RSS feeds, Share options and REST API are also utilized. Open source software like Drupal, OpenLayers and GeoServer was used to realize the Tell-on-the-Map service.

The service has shown that people do participate when the participation is made easy and the topic interesting. The image above shows a screenshot of the survey, which collected people's comments about tram line extension in Munkkivuori district. In less than a month the survey amounted to nearly 4000 comments from 600 unique commentators. Based on the usage statistics, the web-based survey was particularly popular among working-age people.

Various surveys made with the Tell-on-the-Map have taught many lessons on how a web-based dialogue can be arranged. For instance the tram line survey's popularity was increased when the main newspaper Helsingin Sanomat wrote on the subject. Even more popular was a survey related to the winter maintenance of the streets, in three months it gathered close to 50 000 responses. This large amount of responses, however produced its own challenges. The department responsible for the street maintenance would have welcomed more comments about the quality of snow plowing on areas where it had been done. Now due to the snowy winter, the feedback was mainly on areas that have not been plowed. The lesson was that the surveys should be directed more accurately.

http://kerrokartalla.hel.fi/

New local democracy based on open dialogue

Citizens' active participation which is based on their own motivation is not representative in nature. People form groups around and act just for the causes that are interesting to them. When decision-making processes rely on civic participation attention must be paid to the issues of liability, of representation and equality.

In the current practice of representative democracy, politicians and parties are held accountable for the decisions and the civil cervants for preparation and execution. How will the decision-making practice look like in the future? Decision-making system changes the state has paid attention to, inter alia, the data center of Helsinki researcher Pia Backlund, who wrote: "Local action today is characterized by the lack of clarity about what kind of internal logic of the operation of the planning and decision-making system is based on - and what kind it should lean on."

Digitization of the old is not enough - a smart city needs a new concept of local democracy, because the environment has fundamentally changed and the current political decision-making structure is from last or the previous century. The big change will not happen overnight, but it consists of a number of minor changes whicha are realized over time. Something that seems to be common for many recent examples of civic participation solutions, also those presented in this report, is that the dialogue between different actors becomes open.

For example, via above mentioned Tell-on-the-Map application citizens may comment on the urban development plans so that the comments are visible to all. The Service map application (see chapter 3.) in turn enable the peole to give

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 45 (143)



feedback to the various city services and agencies so that on the messages are visible to all other users of the Service Map. Also the open data portal Helsinki Region Infoshare (see the case later in this chapter) encourage people to open dialogue. It is possible to ask questions and leave comments related to published datasets either directly at the data catalogue service or the Facebook group of Helsinki Region Infoshare. Thanks to an open debate various shortcomings and errors of the published datasets have been quickly noticed and sometimes even corrected by the users of the service. In the old model of a closed dialogue, feedback and opinions were communicated mostly in one-to-one manner either by email or over phone. The wider community didn't know what the others had commented and couldn't participate the discussion with their own solutions.

Open data in Helsinki

“Information resources produced using public funding will be opened up for public and corporate access. The goal is to make digital data materials managed by the public sector available to citizens, companies, enterprises and organisations, authorities, and for research and education purposes in an easily reusable format via information networks.” Programme of Prime Minister Jyrki Katainen’s Government. (2011)

The ever-strengthening movement of open data in Helsinki and around the world is tending towards a situation in which the public sector in particular but also companies and other organisations are openly offering data that they possess for the use of everyone. Open data is part of the “Open Helsinki” vision where information, ideas, thoughts and people can move freely without unnecessary, creativity-hampering obstacles. Open data is also considered to be of strategic importance for the City of Helsinki in the city’s new information technology strategy (Information technology program of the City of Helsinki 2012–2014).

‘Open data’ means that the data is freely available without charge to all parties and to other web-based services, insofar as it is not confidential. The public content of information systems is available in machine-readable format for the utilisation for example in internet services, mobile applications, information systems or various customer applications.

Image: Open government data is the part of public data sets that are openly accessible to anybody in machine readable form and free of charge. Part of the government data is confidential and can never be opened up, but there are many public data sets that are currently hard to access, but hopefully opened up in the future.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 46 (143)



Through discussions, reports and projects, openness has rapidly become a key word in the vocabulary of administration. In discussions on openness, there is simultaneous talk about open licensing, technical interfaces, formats, metadata, the harmonisation of data, the transparency of administration, the opportunities for human participation, the principle of publication, reusability and machine-readability. It is not exceptional for different parties to mean different things.

The openness of data, and the right of access to it, should not be confused. ‘Open data’ means information which can be reused by anyone, without technical, legal or financial barriers. According to legislation, ‘public data’ on the other hand means information which is not subject to the laws of privacy protection – such as person registers – or cannot be interpreted as legally sensitive for other reasons, such as national security. Naturally, data that is not public cannot be open.

The technical ease of use of data does not automatically mean that it is open. Especially when talking about “open interfaces”, it is worth taking into account the fact that technically easily available data can be subject to conditions limiting its reuse or redistribution. Correspondingly, there may be cases where completely open data is not very easily usable, for example because of a difficult file format, difficulty in finding it or deficient documentation.

The Helsinki region has pioneered open data in Finland, for example through the Helsinki Region Infoshare (HRI) project and the excellent interface (API) work for Helsinki Region Transport. In both cases, it is a question of the City’s information being openly put at the disposal of all who are interested. The work is still ongoing and only a small proportion of all the City’s data has so far been opened, but through this work, experience has been gained and structures have been created concerning open data practices as described in the following cases and viewpoints.

Case 4: Helsinki Region Infoshare – the city’s internal open data consultant

The Helsinki Region Infoshare (HRI) project that was launched in 2010 is opening up information about the Helsinki region for the free and free-of-charge use of all, such as citizens, businesses, universities, colleges, research institutes and public administration.

Behind it is the idea that the opening up of public information increases people’s knowledge and understanding of the development of the region in which they live. This in turn improves the conditions for civic activity. The availability of

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 47 (143)



open data may also create for the region new services and business and promote research and development work.

The project has developed a regional operating model for open data, in which the HRI project organisation has acted as the intermediary organisation in the opening up of the capital region’s information. Within the framework of the project, a network of owners of basic data pools and materials has been created. Its participants produce, maintain, distribute and develop network data pools in co-operation using common ground rules.

The project has mainly opened up statistical data relating in diverse ways to different urban phenomena, such as living, the economy, well-being, employment and travel. The opened data pools can easily and quickly be found through the data.hri.fi data catalogue service. Users can download information and use it, for example, in decision-making, include it in their applications or build completely new services based on it. For example, the Finnish media has built data journalistic application based on HRI data, such as a map of traffic accidents in Helsinki.

Positive experiences of the HRI project have also had a major impact on the City of Helsinki’s information technology strategy and the “Open Helsinki” vision which has resulted in that, for example, the World Design Capital year in Helsinki consists of many open data related activities.

http://www.hri.fi/

Ad hoc idea incubators analyse and utilise city data

In order to encourage the urban community to take advantage of open data and in order to generate ideas to develop the city, the City of Helsinki has actively encouraged and supported developers of computer and mobile software to create new applications for the city’s open data. In recent years, application competitions run by organisations such as Apps4Finland and Helsinki Region Transport (HRT) have been held, as a result of which hundreds of open data applications have been created. At the same time, knowledge about the potential of open data has spread and several new companies have been established by the teams that participated in the competitions.

“In my opinion, the creation of services without the City being involved in all of them is a terrifically smart idea, for which people active in the urban community across organisational boundaries deserve thanks,” says City of Helsinki IT director Markku Raitio. This means that the municipality does not need to stretch its own resources into fields where other parties in the urban community can provide some city-related service better.

Applications developed by the community can also be decisive in the small ’niche’ requirements of citizens, when municipal resources are insufficient or when it makes no sense to use them for that purpose. “The city should be more reminiscent of the development of the Linux system than that of the mainframe system,” explains Petri Aukia, managing director of the software company Codento. Typical of the thinking behind the open source code Linux is the fact that someone somewhere in the world will have developed an application for even the most ‘niche’ of needs. Or if that is not the case, you can do it yourself if you have the programming ability.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 48 (143)



From an open data point of view, the people of Helsinki constitute an exceptional community in Finland. Due to being the capital city, lots of public workers and many state administration officials and decision-makers live in Helsinki. Helsinki has the most people employed in analysis and decision-making, and it has exceptional expertise in public administration. Helsinki has the best Finnish skills in open data analysis and the greatest number of available thinkers.

The Long Tail phenomenon is perhaps applicable to the use of open data. Whenever an issue is considered, no matter how obscure, it is probable that somewhere in the world – or even in the city – there is someone else who is interested in that very question. If a city publishes information and even a few people in the city grasp the issue, they form a kind of ad hoc idea incubator, the results of which can prove highly valuable and beneficial from the city’s perspective. This can result in making better decisions in the city or for example as mobile applications that help the citizens in their daily life.

Case 5: The Apps4Finland competition

“We need open data, so that people can participate and public administration can better meet the needs of people’s everyday lives.”- Paavo Arhinmäki, Minister of Culture and Sports, at the Apps4Finland Gala on 22 November 2011

The third Apps4Finland competition was held in 2011. It inspired a record number of people to think about and develop new ways to utilise the open data pools of public administration. The competition attracted 140 entries and the quality was very high. The entries dealt with transport in the city and countryside. The visualisations concerning society and politics illustrated information in an easily understandable form, increasing social transparency. Prizes totalling €21,000 were awarded. There were four categories: Idea, Application, Visualisation and Data. There were also special prizes.

The winner of the Application category was ParkkiNappi by Neligrate Oy. Using this application, you can pay for parking your car without coins and automatic ticket machines with a very simple mobile phone application. It makes travelling in the city easier and speeds things up for drivers. The Visualisation category was won by Lauri Vanhala’s Helsinki Public Transport Visualized video (pictured). In an impressive way, it shows how public transport in the capital region springs to life every morning. This beautiful work uses different data

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 49 (143)



sources in a varied way. It is a fine illustration of how you do not necessarily have to use your own car to travel in the capital region, with such a highly comprehensive the public transport network.

http://www.apps4finland.fi

Open data business opportunities in Helsinki

The promotion of business is the second major objective in open data. It creates exceptional opportunities for success in technological industries, says Petri Aukia. “There are very few technical means for Helsinki to help companies in Helsinki or in its surrounding area to achieve a competitive edge globally. The intention is to make open data inevitable, coming to all municipalities through electronic means at some stage. In order to get those cities and municipalities with open data to open it smartly and in good time, local industries are being established with access to better data resources than competitors from cities that are many years behind.”

All in all, public administration represents about one quarter of the Finnish IT industry. That means that whilst making the systems for about five million Finnish people, it has been possible to employ one quarter of the Finnish IT sector. Petri Aukia envisions that if, as we get accustomed to the openness of public administration in Finland, we are able to open up data more quickly than elsewhere, then the target market would be the whole of the western world in which about one billion people live; a market 200 times larger than that of Finland.

In Aukia’s opinion, we are looking at a Nokia-scale opportunity – but only if Finland acts with sufficient speed so that everywhere else in the world comes to buy Finnish open data expertise and systems. “Our advantage is that we are comparatively incorrupt and we have an officialdom that takes quite a positive attitude towards transparency. To get this going in a commercial way is an opportunity that only comes along once. If the opportunity isn’t seized, it will be missed,” predicts Aukia.

For the media, open data enables new kinds of article types based on data, as well as data journalism where, by combining and visualising data, new types of data-based journalism can be created. The end result may be, for example, web applications or different kinds of visualisations in newspapers. Teppo Moisio of the Helsingin Sanomat says that in the newspaper on which he works, they have already being doing basic data journalism for a long time based on the support of Statistics Finland where, on request, the media can get answers to its questions. In these cases, however, journalists themselves have got to – or had to – work with raw data. “We are of course not necessarily as good at doing research reports as the people at Statistics Finland or other municipal researchers. But it would seem that, through open data, the city can get more people – free researchers – to chew over its data.”

The publication of open data also produces news, as journalists notice new data and begin to consider what could be done with it. “Ideas don’t usually come from nothing. They have some trigger,” says Moisio.

In open data, Petri Aukia also sees employment opportunities. For example, expertise in the programming of information systems for mobile phone networks is also a useful skill in the processing of large volumes of open data and in its related programming. In each case, the problems are mathematical, the only difference being whether the programme is performed within the mobile phone network or with a computer that processes open data.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 50 (143)



Application Programming Interfaces are the ‘spirit of the game’ in the future

The future large-scale support of open data is one reason why the City of Helsinki has a strong interest in getting interfaces to cover all future information systems and making data move between systems more flexibly than at present. The use of interfaces does not indicate which part of the data is public and which part for internal use only, but by using interfaces is data easily available outside the system if desired.

One important reason to seek interfaces is the desire to avoid being locked to the original system supplier. Through interfaces, additional features can be ordered from other suppliers, because the core of the system – its data – is available through the interfaces. Without interfaces, there is often a situation where only the original system supplier can make changes. “In the field of suppliers, we must say frankly that the public sector in Finland requires such things. If in future you want to operate in this market, then this is the ‘spirit of the game’,” says Markku Raitio.

The requirement for interfaces is a change in the rules which can significantly alter the business models of system suppliers. The supplier of a flexible solution will in future consent to competing on an equal basis with other suppliers in terms of changes and maintenance. But this may also increase the price of the original system. “It is quite clearly evident that if, in competition, we only stress price and in particular the price of acquisition, it is virtually sure that we will get a system that is not open, has insufficient interfaces, and will not operate flexibly without the supplier sending a large bill each and every time,” says Ari Andersin, who is in charge of overall IT architecture for the City of Helsinki.

“In public administration, it is regrettably typical that efforts are made to divide up a major investment so that the first stage does not seem expensive, but the following stages might be,” says Petri Aukia. “It could prove cheaper to take a loan from the bank and put out to tender both the maintenance and development stage.” At the same time, it will become clearer what the costs of the systems are over their entire life cycle.

“I believe that as a result of the activation of the field, these operative system suppliers will also take full advantage of the opening of these interfaces themselves,” says Markku Raitio.

Case 6: Open data interface for public transport journey planner

Helsinki Region Transport (HRT) offers the developers open data through their own interfaces. This data is offered from many sources: routings for public transport, cycling and walking, route and bus stop timetables, traffic disruptions and even the real-time positioning of some vehicles. The opening of interfaces to public use is a natural part of the service development map. At first, there was a need to transfer data between the company’s own services built at different times and by different suppliers. Gradually, the interfaces have been opened and also developed for open use.

HRT develops and maintains a well-known, efficient Journey Planner service, by which passengers can find the fastest route to their destination. By also opening up the high-quality data of this service to other developers, HRT did not need to be responsible for investments in countless constantly changing mobile device environments in addition to the web service. The interface has been very popular and is now being used by about 200 developers, which are developing user interface versions of the Journey Planner for many different mobile devices and purposes. Citizens get better services, developers more income and HRT more

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 51 (143)



satisfied customers.

HRT’s interfaces are also used in many services which are not centred on public transport, but which are complemented by the information in the Journey Planner. These include mobile applications guiding people to events or other services, which can at the same time offer a smarter route to the destination. The second example is real estate services, which can visualise, on a map, daily journey times depending on the location of a dwelling or place of work.

http://developer.reittiopas.fi

Conclusions • Helsinki’s concept is that the smartness of the smart city lies in its people.

The city develops in dialogue between the urban community and municipal organisation.

• The city should share all its public data with the community, so that dialogue spawns new ideas. One part of this activity is open data.

• Helsinki has successfully experimented with open data – so far hundreds of applications utilising the data have been created. Furthermore, the City of Helsinki has developed procedures for publishing open data.

• Open interfaces are an important step in the development of the City’s systems. They help bring about interoperability, reduce commitments for system suppliers and will in future enable open data at the level of all systems.

4.3 A COMPLEX GIANT

“Probably at the moment nobody in the City of Helsinki actually has an overall picture of the organisation’s information systems.” - Ari Andersin, Project Manager, Enterprise Architecture, the City of Helsinki

Open data in Helsinki can be considered as a next step of the centuries long traditions of transparency and access to information in the Nordic countries. The Swedish-Finnish Freedom of the Press Act, which came into force in 1766, was the world’s first piece of legislation on the freedom of knowledge. Since then, the social norm in the Nordic countries has been the right of access to information. Keeping information secret is an exception, which requires legal justification.

The right of access to documents and their availability are not, however, the same thing. Despite the principles of openness, obtaining official documents has required a considerable degree of effort, such as a visit to the archives of certain authorities and knowledge about what is available and in which archive. In addition, for example in Helsinki, based on our interviews, the city does not even itself know what all information it has about itself. Therefore, there is also not a single citizen who could know what information he or she could request from the city. Clarifying the issue of what information and digital data the city has about itself is considerably hampered by the fact that Helsinki’s municipal organisation is very extensive and complex. Few if any fully understand how it works.

Finland’s most complex organisation?

The Helsinki region is home to about 1.3 million people and hosts 738,100 jobs. The actual city of Helsinki has 588,549 residents (2011). The City of Helsinki is Finland’s largest employer and one of Finland’s largest and most complex organisations. It employs about 39,000 people. It has 29 departments and six public service corporations. It also owns 112 limited companies and 12 foundations, which employ a total of about 4,400 people.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 52 (143)



The work of Helsinki’s municipal organisation is very extensive. For example, it takes care of education, health, social services, public transport, libraries and cultural services, energy maintenance, water, the street networks and countless other things. It is not surprising that based on interviews we conducted, nobody feels that they understand exactly how the City of Helsinki functions.

Just one individual issue, perhaps sorting out with the authorities a wrongly-placed pile of snow, can require communication with many different departments, each of which is partially responsible for the matter in question. You need to know about legislation, contracts and other things if you want to be able to know who handles what. “All sectors seem constantly to be overlapping and adjacent to each other. They are crying out for more co-operation” says Pirjo Tulikukka, the executive director of the Helsinki Neighbourhoods Association.

In the global context, Finland’s system of administration is very local government-centred. In many other countries, for example, health care is the responsibility of the national, regional, state or provincial government. In Finland, the large majority of the responsibility for the provision of public services rests with local government. The municipal organisation might be complex and sometimes not fit for purpose, but each department and unit is responsible for the provision of some service, which justifies its very existence.

The operations of the City are not a permanent construction; the organisation is constantly developing in different spheres. Correspondingly, as the City’s departments, offices, companies and other parties constantly develop their own activities, situations regularly crop up where functions overlap. In such cases, it is necessary to clarify job descriptions. The City is more reminiscent of a living organism than a static diagram.

The diagram below is a comparison between the 1970s organisation and the present one. Many functions have changed places, units have merged and new ones have been created.

The municipal organisation of Helsinki 1971 (left) and 2011 (right).

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 53 (143)



A fundamentally simpler or more easily understandable organisational structure is difficult to develop, as many services must, however, be produced by somebody in some organisation. Above all, the modification of structures is no guarantee of better service provision. “What is essential is how this looks to the people of the city. How they find things, whom they should contact if they want to know or ask something. The organisations in themselves are not the problem, because people don’t need to know about these organisations,” says Deputy Mayor Pekka Sauri.

The City’s structures and organisations are also enablers. They must be flexible enough to allow and give space for free innovation. When new ideas are then created, the best of them should be adopted by the City as normal practice. An example of this is the Restaurant Day phenomenon described earlier.

A more everyday example of the flexibility of the City’s officials is the way in which planning permission applications are dealt with. “Particularly in large projects, we endeavour to ensure that the matter is dealt with unofficially before it becomes an official application, so that everything can be looked at the preliminary stage and guided in the right direction from a planning perspective,” says Matti Nikupeteri of the Building Regulation Department of the City of Helsinki. “We rarely make negative decisions. If a negative decision is to be made, it is usually agreed with the applicant.”

Data is the DNA of the city

The operations of the City entail a great deal of data. Some of the services provided by the City are such that the less residents know about the details, the more content they are. For example, running water requires complex systems to ensure that it is available to all at the correct pressure, it is potable, the correct temperature and flows without interruption. As far as the average resident is concerned, the less you have to think about the whole water system, the better. Usually if drinking water is in the news, it is not very positive.

In other cases, however, citizens may want more detailed information about what the city is doing. For example, these days users of public transport feel it is useful to know perhaps where each bus and tram is situated at a certain time or by how much a train is delayed. Through such information, users of public transport can, for example, save time and optimise their journeys. It is also fun to follow the amount of space on public transport. The border between information and entertainment is becoming blurred – the city is turning into a game.

Sometimes applications can also control the city. The City of Helsinki is putting positioning transmitters on its snow ploughs, which enable people to follow the movements of the ploughs on a map. By clicking on the map, you can also report problems with snow. Your own notification will then appear on the map and, by following the map you can see when a snow plough will arrive at the problem location. “There is clear interest in this and people like things of this kind. It has elements of a game about it,” says Pekka Sauri.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 54 (143)



Image: The position of Helsinki trams on Friday 23 March 2012 at 12.35 pm.

The City’s processes and decision-making entail a great deal of data. Without data, the City could not operate in an organised fashion. For example, the control of a power station requires information about present and predicted energy needs and the production capacity of other power stations. The City’s strategic decisions concerning city planning, for example, require statistics and other relevant facts. The results of voting are recorded in the decisions of the City Council.

Through the Plans on a map (Suunnitelmat kartalla) service, citizens and others who are interested can follow what projects are going on in the city and where, illustrated on a map.

Each location on the map refers current or planned project in the city. When a specific location is highlighted, detailed information about the project is shown on the left.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 55 (143)



Case 7: Plans on a map “The reason I like this service is because it shows how the process actually works. And yes, it is a bit clumsy, bureaucratic and crazy, but that’s how it works.” Otso Kivekäs, Member of the Public Works Committee

In the Plans on a map (Suunnitelmat kartalla) service provided by the Helsinki City Planning Department, you can read about the planning situation for City planning, partial disposition plans and traffic plans. The service also provides project planning material. When planning for a project begins, the service gives a short explanation of what the whole thing is about and shows the affected area on a map. Then, as the project progresses, the service publishes documents and other material generated during the process. Citizens have the opportunity to comment on the projects, both online and at specially organised residents’ evenings. It also gives the contact information for the person responsible for each project. Benefits of the service include the fact that although the progress of projects is often complex and bureaucratic, the City openly reveals how the process works, so people interested in each project can genuinely participate in discussion on the project and influence the actions of the City.

http://ptp.hel.fi/hanke/

A significant proportion of the information concerning the city is in digital format in the City’s different information systems, but some of it is also in other formats such as paper and archived microfilm. So-called tacit knowledge, in the possession of people themselves is one of the key forms of knowledge within the municipal organisation. An important topical challenge is ensuring the knowhow of retiring city employees is transferred to the next working generation.

When talking about the digital information of the public administration, the well-known basic registers usually come to mind, such as the population register, the property register and perhaps also statistical data and weather information. Maps and geo information are quite well-known and some people also mention varieties of traffic information. Data related to cities particularly includes information on living, public transport, safety, social affairs and health and other services. This list can be lengthened and made more specific, but understanding the overall picture is nonetheless difficult.

It must also be remembered that information on public administration is only a small part of all the information concerning an individual city. For example, companies and individual cities have much digital information which in one way or another concerns the city, such as tourists’ holiday snaps of the city or information from local taxi companies about where you can go by cab.

A city's information systems strongly reflect how its service production is organised. “These days, a information system and the operations of its organisation are completely integrated. All the development projects of the organisation are also information system development projects, and all successful system projects are at the same time operating method projects,” says IT specialist Otso Kivekäs, who is both a member of the Public Works Committee of the City of Helsinki and an active cyclist.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 56 (143)



Case 8: Service map

The service map is an open information channel about municipal offices and services in the capital region. It provides contact information about each office as well as its website, topical issues, nearest bus stops, transport connections and accessibility. In Helsinki, the map can also be used to check different kinds of population information (age, language, average size of dwellings) or browse feedback given to offices, events or tourism sights. Through the map it is possible to give feedback and to enter into open discussion directly with the people in charge of offices and services.

Once the basic service was set up in Helsinki, an almost infinite number of possibilities to improve it became evident. Developers almost instantly received feedback, asking why Helsinki was producing a map service from which data could not be exported to Google Maps and combined with other data. For that reason, the City quickly published a Google-compatible KML interface and then thought ‘great, that’s settled.’ But no. Next, people asked why the service map included only Helsinki services. Did they think that, in the capital region, only Helsinki data was sufficient?

It was decided to make a general service map for the whole capital region. The classification and harmonisation of an enormous volume of data had already been done in Helsinki and now a great deal of extra work had to be done. The developers of the service thought about such things as how to define the right service words and how to make searches user-friendly so that the data could be presented in an understandable way. The organisational jargon used by officials was not necessarily comprehensible to ordinary citizens.

Public administration is not always very nimble at reaching the pinnacle of development, and so it is also important to be involved in topical discussions about opening interfaces and data, and in implementing concrete solutions. The aim is for the reliable and up-to-date information produced by public administration to be in as accessible a form as possible, and for us to be aware of all the freely available applications that are being produced for its utilisation.

http://www.hel.fi/palvelukartta

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 57 (143)



By checking information systems and the digital data they contain as a whole, it can be seen in a new light how the municipal organisation and the city as a whole function on a practical level. For an organisation, data is a kind of DNA, which reveals what is happening in the city. Digital data offers a new kind of overall image of how a city functions.

We believe that at the level of this digital information, cities are more reminiscent of each other than at first glance or for example when comparing the organisational structure of cities as, although there are differences between cities and countries in relation to who delivers municipal services – the municipal organisation or some other body – the needs of citizens are, however, quite the same everywhere. Everyone needs health care, education, water, electricity, heating, the opportunity to move from one place to another, etc. Because of this, organisations responsible for municipal services – be they the city’s internal bodies or other actors – record in their information systems largely similar data, which is comparable. We believe that digital information offers a very interesting way to view the city as whole. Such an overall digital picture would also be valuable for the city itself.

A glance at a city’s digital information as a whole might give municipal experts the same kind of overall picture as maybe a comparison between geographical maps, from which a traffic expert can see at a glance the characteristics of certain cities. For example, Helsinki lies on a peninsula, Barcelona between the sea and the mountains and Berlin and Vienna are circular cities.

Image: The geographical map is a classic way of forming an overall image of a city.

Case 9: Ahjo: the digitisation of decision-making processes

“Sure, every day people curse this system... there are still things to improve, but nevertheless it is a big thing that we have moved to a paperless decision-making process." - Deputy Mayor Pekka Sauri

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 58 (143)



In 2011, the City of Helsinki introduced a new case management system, Ahjo, which changed how decisions and documents are processed and made meetings procedures fully electronic. In connection with this process of digitisation, processes also changed, the functions of 35 administrative bodies were merged and, thanks to Ahjo, time, trouble and paper were saved in administration. Previously, registry offices managing documents needed a staff of 80, but now they can get by on a quarter of that. The City Board and Council alone had annually consumed 11 million sheets of paper, so the reduction in paper consumption is also bringing savings of hundreds of thousands of euros.

Ahjo users include not only 600 elected officials but also about 5,000 other municipal office holders and other employees such as draftsmen, presenters, keepers of minutes and information officers. Meetings of the Council, City Board, committees and management boards are held electronically in the Ahjo system.

The investment of money and working hours into this reform is a significant ecological act, but in future it will also open up completely new opportunities for more and more citizens to participate in the preparation of matters to be raised and in the decision-making process. Once information is in electronic form, the next logical step is to open up to a suitable extent the data contained in the system for the use of anyone. Electronic documents contain metadata, by which documents related to the processing of each case can easily be found, and they can be linked both to each other and to other data concerning the case in hand, such as statistics or background financial information.

It is not worthwhile for the City itself to develop all applications supporting decision-making and communications, as the opening of data and interfaces also enables the input of other parties. Preliminary work to open Ahjo has begun in co-operation with the developers.

Ahjo brings paperless decision-making to Helsinki (Story from the service provider Tieto)

At present nobody knows exactly all the digital information that the City of Helsinki has. Even the City itself does not have complete overview on all the information systems it has in its dozens of different departments and public service corporations. It has been estimated that altogether there are about a thousand information systems.

The decentralized operating model of the city means that not even the IT Division has access to all the data. “People often imagine that the boss of IT has access to all data, but that's not the case," says Markku Raitio. But the situation is now gradually changing. The aim is for the examination of municipal operations through a digital database to enable the transcending of traditional ‘silo boundaries’ within the organisation, thereby bringing added value to the internal functions of organisations.

Helsinki is thought to be one of the top cities for IT exploitation in such spheres as electronic business and web services. In spite of this, there is no overarching picture of the City’s information systems. We have also asked other cities about their situation, and the end-result is always the same: nobody has a comprehensive overall picture of the data and information systems of their city. Even in the catalogues of open data that have proliferated in different cities in recent times, such as the Helsinki region’s Infoshare data.hri.fi and the City of London’s London Datastore, there has been no joy for people trying to piece together an overall picture, because they only list material that is already open, and do not tell what data is not available. There is therefore reason to assume that, in addition to Helsinki, other cities are also unclear about all the information that they actually have.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 59 (143)



Conclusions • Digital information offers a new perspective for understanding municipal

operations. It helps in the understanding of complex organisations, such as the City of Helsinki.

• Nobody knows all the data that the City of Helsinki has, so there is not a single citizen who can know what data he or she could request from the city.

• If it were possible to establish what data the City of Helsinki actually has, we could also get a better overall picture of how the organisation of the City of Helsinki functions.

• Other cities in the world are probably also unclear about what data they actually possess.

4.4 THE CITY OF DATA

“Visualising data improves the understanding and utilisation possibilities of the data. Visualisation also creates the possibility of viewing the raw data from different perspectives - potentially combining different sources and viewpoints. The results can be used for improving both decision making and for creating new service innovations. The value of information is created by using it.” Markku Raitio, IT Director, City of Helsinki

One of the authors of this report, Antti Poikola, lectured in the autumn of 2011 at a data journalism course on the use of public data for journalistic purposes. The course required a comprehensive overview of the information resources possessed by the City. The City’s web site listed the information systems of the various municipal agencies, and also included the system descriptions required by law, but the information was not up to date. To receive the most up-to-date information on the systems, Poikola made an freedom of information request at the municipal Registrar’s Office.

The information request and the need for an overall view of Helsinki’s information resources attracted interest from the City’s IT management department, which was working on the same questions. The charting of information systems that originated in the data journalism course was taken forward. The results are included in this report. The following describes how the charting of Helsinki’s information systems was carried out using this public information. What was the picture of the city’s information systems that emerged?

A single list of Helsinki’s information systems

With the help of the Registrar’s Office, we received lists of information systems from nearly all municipal agencies and public utilities. On the part of information systems, the view is relatively comprehensive. But in addition, many pieces of municipal information are found in isolated documents outside the systems. No information system description has been made for these documents, and for this reason they are not covered by the charting. Examples of excluded information are various statistics and background materials for reports that are saved in a format such as Excel.

The number of information systems varied widely from agency to agency. On average, the agencies had approximately 18 catalogued information systems. A few had only one system catalogued. The Port of Helsinki had the largest number of systems (54). To form an overview, the information in the various documents was compiled into one overall list. After faulty entries and duplicates were removed, it included a total of 595 information systems.

Many of the systems are connected to the running of the municipal administration. These systems are typical of all agencies: for instance, the systems related to staff, access control, monitoring of working time, travel management and financial administration. On the other hand, the systems

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 60 (143)



related to production of services are often agency-specific. Among the more specialised systems are the control of traffic lights, the database on financial assistance for building of lifts and the registry of trees planted in the city streets. The following table includes more examples of information systems and their contents that do not come to mind very easily.

Agency Name of system Intended use Information content Administration Centre

Medals of the President of the Republic

Applying for the decorations issued by the President of the Republic

Information on the decorations applied for and issued by the President of the Republic to city staff and elected officials

Port of Helsinki Vessel diary Reporting of traffic by vessels Information on vessels leaving and arriving at the Port of Helsinki

Helsinki City Library

Sanojen aika Searchable database of writers

Presentations of writers

City Museum MediaKsi Management system for the City Museum’s collections and content information

Information on cataloguing and acquisition of the museum’s collections

Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra

Opas Tool for preparing sheet music and planning programmes

Information on composers, compositions and line-ups for sheet music; information on concerts; work list

City Planning Department

Traffic light control systems

Direction of traffic Use of traffic lights


Production of plans City plans and traffic plans Plans


Planning and calculation of traffic network

Planning of traffic network Traffic volumes

Real Estate Department/ Housing Division

Database on financial assistance for the installation of lifts

Database software used to compile statistics on municipal 10% lift assistance granted by the City of Helsinki

Information on the recipients of assistance and their agents; amounts of assistance granted; expenditures

Youth Department Hobby search Facilitation of hobbies for youth

Information on hobbies, hobby arrangers, facilities; information on youth found in personal registry descriptions

Education Department

Camera surveillance system

Camera surveillance The system records images of people moving in the cameras’ area of operation. Dates and times are also recorded. Speech is not recorded.

Rescue Department

Merlot Medi Web Reporting

Reporting of paramedics’ tasks

Information on clients and measures taken during paramedics’ emergency calls

Rescue Department

Facta registry of municipalities – Primas

Information on population; information on property registration

Information on population, building permits, planning and properties

Public Works Surveillance Department

Facta registry of municipalities – Facta building surveillance

Granting of building permits, surveillance during building work, continuous surveillance, etc.

Building and building permits; information on surveillance during building work and continuous surveillance

Public Works Surveillance Department

Comet parking fee system

Loading of money into parking fee meters

?

Table: Examples of the systems found by charting information systems.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 61 (143)



Keywords as the basis of an overview

The general features, informational content and purpose of the information systems were described with free-form keywords, such as economy, billing and purchase bill. Proper names, names of agencies and words referring to geographic areas were avoided to make the keywords as comparable as possible with other cities. Housing, traffic, health, education, administration and many other similar concepts describe cities around the world, although organisations and areas of responsibility may vary.

Currently, the keywords may still include words that are synonymous with each other. Some of the words introduced through manual keywording are not very descriptive (e.g. information, subject). There are over 800 keywords, of which more than half occur only once. The list of keywords is too long to be useful. The table below gives key information on the material.

The agencies and public utilities covered by the charting

33 There are 35 agencies in all. The information on Helsingin Energia and the Wholesale Food Market is missing.

Number of information systems in the overall list

595 In the original lists of information systems, the number of systems was slightly higher. When the lists were harmonised, clearly superfluous entries (e.g. e-mail clients) were removed. Also removed were duplicates, i.e. systems used by more than one agency and entered in the lists of the different agencies.

Average number of systems per agency

18.3 The Port of Helsinki had the most systems (54 in all). A few agencies only had one catalogued system.

The number of keywords used in description

845 Most keywords (570) were used only once. The material included a total of 1,684 keywords. The most common keywords and their frequency are shown in the next table.

Average number of keywords per system

2 The number of keywords varied from 0 to 7. There were 18 systems without any keywords.

Table: Statistical data on the City’s information systems.

The most common keywords were client, staff, library, working time and access control. Other common keywords were related to areas such as financial administration, properties and document management. The list of the most common keywords is not very surprising. On the evidence of its information systems, the municipal organisation would appear to concentrate on clients and staff.

The following table compares the information systems’ most common keywords with the keywords of the Helsinki open data catalogue (HRI). It would be useful to make the lists of keywords uniform in the future. This would enable linking of open information content and information systems.

Overall catalogue of information systems 595 information systems keyworded with 845 keywords, used for a total of 1,684 times

Helsinki Region Infoshare data catalogue 869 information systems keyworded with 669 keywords, used for a total of 5,531 times

client (40) helsinki (295)

staff (31) vantaa (250)

library (25) age (203)

working time (22) population (171)

access control (20) gender (143)

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 62 (143)



Table: On the left, the most common keywords in the charting discussed here. On the right, the most common keywords of the Helsinki Region Infoshare data catalogue.

From a list to a map

A list of information systems is interesting, but it is not yet in an easily understandable format. It is hard to see how systems are connected to each other, or to get an overview of everything that belongs to the digital field formed by the City’s information systems. We decided to experiment with visualising the information systems into an image. The Helsinki information system map was born.

Image: A map formed out of the keywords describing the information systems of the City of Helsinki. The key groups of keywords have been marked on the map. A – Social services, B – Health, C – Economic administration/billing, D – Clients, E – Environment, F – Economic administration/accounting, G – Other, H – Surveillance and security, I – Access control, J – Staff/wages, K – Staff/working time.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 63 (143)



Image: Enlargement of “Surveillance and security” (group H above).

A map of the digital Helsinki

The accompanying image shows the map formed out of the lists of Helsinki’s information systems. The visualisation helps one to see the areas in which the systems are grouped according to their content and purpose. On the map, the keywords used to describe the systems form clusters. These can easily be interpreted as larger functional wholes, such as “health” or “environment”. The key functional wholes have been named in the overall picture. Underneath is an enlargement of the group of keywords related to surveillance and security.

Technically, the map is based on a network graph; the keywords describing the information systems are its nodes. Two keywords (nodes) have been linked with a curved line where an information system has been described with both words.

The following image shows an enlargement of the words “työaika” (working time), “henkilöstö” (staff) and “kulunvalvonta” (access control) occurring close to each other. Among other things, they connected to each other by the access control system named Timecon. Because the same keywords have also been used to describe other information systems, they are linked in the network graph to these systems, such as wage calculation, work shift and key management systems. In this way, the hundreds of keywords used to describe information systems are linked, placed on the map and grouped into thematic clusters.

Image: Enlargement of “Access Control” (group I in the overview image)

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 64 (143)



To make the overview image clearer, keywords linked only weakly to the whole have been filtered out. Such keywords have been used to describe just one or two information systems. For instance, the programm planning and sheet music design software used by the Helsinki Philharmonic has received keywords such as “nuotti” (sheet music), “sävellys” (composition) and “orkesteri” (orchestra), which do not occur in relation to any other information system. For this reason they are not shown on the map. After filtering, approximately one third of the keywords in the original material are shown.

Image: An example of weakly linked keywords that are filtered out of the overview image for clarity. These keywords only describe one information system used by the Helsinki Philharmonic; they are not linked to the larger overall picture.

Possible uses for the information system map

The Helsinki information system map presented above is a first sketch of what a map of a city’s virtual reality could be. In our view, even this sketch will begin to yield new information on a city’s existing systems and the connections between them.

The map gives an overview of the City’s information systems that transcends organisational borders. Currently, the financial administrators are familiar with financial software and the geographic information people with geographic information systems; but nobody knows the whole. The information system map could help the persons responsible for the systems of the various agencies to see them as parts of a larger whole. In developing the architecture of the information systems, the map can be compared to a city map used in city planning. It is a picture of the current state that makes it possible to plan the future.

In addition, the map would make it possible for both the city and the open-data community to find the as yet unopened public data possessed by the city and the people responsible for it. Perhaps the map will also become a treasure hunter’s map from time to time; it can be used to find lost, forgotten or unknown information systems with valuable data in them.

Actors outside the municipal organisation would also need an overview. For instance, it would be useful for the open-data developer community to know and understand the systems behind the data. The information could be used in making new applications. Officials of other cities and researchers interested in urban development would perhaps want to compare cities digitally or create an overview of cities’ digital similarities and differences.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 65 (143)



Images could be generated to link municipal agencies to keywords or to systems. It would also be possible to create images on just one specific area, such as a map of the information systems related to ecology and the environment. One obvious use for information system maps is the visualisation of the systems of a country’s entire public administration – or of the systems of any large company or organisation. It would also perhaps be interesting to compare these to cities’ information system maps.

The visual information system map is first and foremost a tool for communication. Visualisation gives birth to discussions that are not possible by just looking at lists. The Helsinki information system map has received excited and immediate comments from the people to whom we have presented the intermediate stages in our work.

Observations on the charting

The large number of information systems

One obvious question is why the City of Helsinki has so many information systems. The large number of systems is partly caused by the way legislation and other rules prevent the use of, say, client information between different agencies, which can often be due to very reasonable privacy concerns.

Another reason is the uncontrolled way systems are sometimes acquired without regard for the whole. “We too have several systems around and installed in the computers that nobody actually ever uses,” says Matti Nikupeteri.

Use of data reveals deficiencies in it

No material is complete or fully free of faults. This is the case especially when updating the material is liable to human error and when it is the task of many people. When materials are used, the errors are revealed. This is entirely a good thing.

In the original lists of information systems, the charting and visualisation revealed faults that made the analysis more difficult. However, whenever these faults come to light, it is possible to correct them systematically for the future.

The City’s information system descriptions were partly incompatible or too brief. For instance, agencies had given notice of the same systems under slightly different names, even though the systems were not actually installed several times but were in shared use.

The lists of information systems also included rather general software, such as e-mail clients and sticker-printing software. The problem was that there was no definition of “information system” anywhere. We concentrated on the information systems that were potential sources of data.

At one phase it emerged that the City Registrar’s Office did not know the numbering used uniquely identify agencies in certain lists of information systems. The numbering was finally discovered on the data catalogue of the Helsinki Region Infoshare as part of the opened economic data on the city. The city’s organisational structure and the names of its various agencies (in Finnish and English) were not available in an unequivocal form, much less a machine-readable one. Information was scattered here and there, and the names were slightly different in each place.

A practical problem for the editing of the information system descriptions was the fact that the original documents were in Word or PDF format. They also had anomalies in presentation that made it more difficult to handle or combine data automatically.

In addition to the challenges mentioned above, it is possible that mistakes were made when editing the information system descriptions; for instance in assigning keywords or copying and pasting texts by hand.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 66 (143)



There were mistakes and incidents on the way and the list of information systems may still contain errors but our general estimate is that the content of the final list or map is not made different in any essential way by any isolated mistakes that may remain.

Could the method be generalized?

In Finland, the law requires all public-sector organisations, such as municipalities and cities, to provide information comparable to the information the charting work was based on. It is thus possible to make a similar map of other municipalities and cities in Finland. It is especially useful for larger cities likely to have many information systems.

The law may not require municipalities and cities to provide similar information in other countries. However, at least some information on every city’s information systems will probably exist for administrative purposes.

Editing the information system descriptions and the map requires some work by hand. It is likely that the information system descriptions contain errors, deficiencies and variation, just as in the case of Helsinki.

Directions for future development

The preliminary visualisation of the map was done using NodeXL and Gephi software intended for network analysis. The Google Refine tool was used to make the data uniform. With these tools, it is possible to search and delimit the data and visualise various subsets. Sadly these cannot be presented comprehensively in this report.

It would also be possible to realise the visualisation as an interactive web page generated directly from the up-to-date system database. Users would be able to carry out text searches and focus the map on even the smallest detail. The existing online map services like Google Maps, currently familiar to all, function as visual interfaces to the physical city. In the same way, the interactive information system map could function as a search interface for the city’s digital information resources and systems.

Currently, any updating of the information concerning the system has not been organised to enable the maintenance of an up-to-date database. The information used for our charting work will also become out of date as agencies renew their systems.

The publication and updating of the lists of information systems should be made uniform. A first step would be to move from text documents to a compatible format, such as Excel spreadsheets. In the long term, our recommendation to the City would be to establish a separate database service for the presentation and administration of the lists of information systems.

If up-to-date descriptions were contained in a single database, classified and tagged in the way described above, the system could be used for automatic generation of the information system descriptions required by law. It could also generate the Helsinki information system map; an up-to-date visual depiction of all the city’s information systems.

As an immediate step for future development of the Helsinki information system map presented here, a prototype is being produced for an online service that would keep the city’s information system descriptions and the information map up to date. The prototype will also enable the map to be published as an interactive application for use by the City or anyone interested in the city itself.

Conclusions • Finnish law requires an information system description for all public-sector

information systems. • By collecting these descriptions together, an overview was created of the

information systems of the City of Helsinki.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 67 (143)



• The Helsinki information system map is a visual presentation of this information. The map is helpful in understanding and discussing the City’s digital information resources.

• It is also possible to draw up an information system map for other cities, both in Finland and elsewhere.

4.5 LESSONS LEARNED

As described previously, in Helsinki, a smart city is considered first and foremost to be based on the smartness of the people of the urban community. Enabling the participation of the people is the key for a city to evolve in to a smart city.

A smart city can be outlined as a city that 1) can combine service production and an innovative environment, 2) exploits all available information in its activities and decision making, 3) fosters a dialogue between the municipality and the urban community, and 4) where the city is not thought as a service organization with citizens as the customers but as an urban community where the citizens are the city.

In relation to this general vision on what a smart city is, and based on the examples and details presented in the previous chapters, we conclude with the following five lessons learned that can be recommended to other cities that are seeking paths to becoming ‘smarter’.

1. Courage to act; balance of creativity and reliability

A good city has discovered the golden mean between reliability and creativity. Services function reliably and with sufficient quality, while the city structure gives room for creativity – a kind of anarchy within the system. Allowing creativity in this way helps give rise to the new ideas that develop the city into a smarter one. Example: Allowing and encouraging the Restaurant Day.

2. Opening up information required internal expertise by the City

Together with the other cities in the region, the City of Helsinki established an internal project, Helsinki Region Infoshare (HRI), to realise and help with the opening-up of information. HRI seeks out information resources to be opened up, negotiates, provides training and creates networks between data producers and users. It also offers support services for data producers. In addition, HRI recognises agents of change within the municipal organisation and offers them support. As an internal function, there is a commitment to opening up information. Deep learning is generated through continuity. A process of change of this kind cannot be driven from the outside. Example: Helsinki Region Infoshare (HRI)

3. Inspire and support the developer community

Open information is not enough by itself. Applications are also needed to make use of it. One way of encouraging the developer community to create new applications is to hold Apps -contests. Several competitions relating to open data in the Helsinki region have been arranged in recent years. For instance, opening up the city transport data has inspired many developers to create applications on top of the data – applications that would otherwise not have been created or which would have been beyond the City’s resources. The first commercial applications have also been created on top of open data. This is one important yardstick and a goal for open data. Example: The Apps4Finland competitions

4. Open processes even when they are a bit embarrassing

The City of Helsinki has a wide-ranging and complex organisation that is impossible to understand completely. Although the City does not always function optimally and there is considerable bureaucracy at times, it is open about the state of its processes. This gives people a chance to participate and affect the City’s decision-making. Openness is one of the Nordic administrative traditions.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 68 (143)



Example: Plans on the map.

5. Draw up an information system map for your city!

As a direct result of this report, we presented the Helsinki information system map as a promising example on how to create an overview of the City’s information resources. This helps the city to understand how to city is organized and what data it possesses about itself which is the first step of utilizing the data more efficiently both inside the city organization and for example publishing it as open data. Experts in Helsinki and in other cities has considered the map to be very interesting.

Find out about the information systems in your city and draw up visualised general views to receive a new kind of overview of the city’s activity. Compare the information maps with those of Helsinki and other cities!

Example: The Helsinki information system map

4.6 LITERATURE

Bettencourt, L. M. A., Lobo, J., Helbing, D., Kühnert, C., & West, G. B. (2007). Growth, innovation, scaling, and the pace of life in cities. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 104 (17), 7301-6. Retrieved from http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/abstract/104/17/7301

Brand, S. (1995). How buildings learn: what happens after they’re built (p. 243). Penguin Books.

Campbell, T. (2012). Beyond Smart Cities: How Cities Network, Learn and Innovate (p. 256). Routledge.

Information technology program of the City of Helsinki 2012–2014. (in Finnish, original title: Helsingin kaupungin tietotekniikkaohjelma 2012–2014.) (2012). Retrieved from http://www.hel2.fi/taske/julkaisut/2012/Tietotekniikkaohjelma_2012-2014.pdf

IBM. (2011). Helsinki raportti - IBM’s Smarter Cities Challenge. Retrieved from http://www.hel.fi/static/taske/julkaisut/2012/IBM_SCC_Helsinki_suomi.pdf

Kepsu, K., Vaattovaara, M., Bernelius, V., & Itälahti, M. (2010). Vetävä Helsinki - Luovien ja tietointensiivisten alojen osaajien näkemyksiä seudusta - kotimainen ja kansainvälinen näkökulma. Retrieved from http://www.hel2.fi/tietokeskus/julkaisut/pdf/10_12_31_tutkimus_4_Kepsu.pdf

Giffinger, R., Fertner, C., Kramar, H., Kalasek, R., Pichler-Milanovi, N., & Meijers, E. (2007). Smart cities Ranking of European medium-sized cities. October. Retrieved from http://www.smart-cities.eu/download/smart_cities_final_report.pdf

Mulgan, G. (n.d.). People & Participation: How to put citizens at the heart of decision-making. October. Involve. Retrieved from http://www.involve.org.uk/people-and-participation/

Nam, T., & Pardo, T. A. (2011). Smart City as Urban Innovation : Focusing on Management, Policy, and Context. 5th International Conference on Theory and Practice of Electronic Governance (ICEGOV2011). Retrieved from http://www.ctg.albany.edu/publications/journals/icegov_2011_smartcity/icegov_2011_smartcity.pdf

Uusi-Autti, N. (2011). Innovaatioverkostojen johtaminen ja kehittäminen - Case Helsinki Region Infoshare. Retrieved from http://www.doria.fi/bitstream/handle/10024/71976/NiinaUusi-Autti.Gradu.pdf?sequence=2

Programme of Prime Minister Jyrki Katainen’s Government. (2011). Retrieved from http://valtioneuvosto.fi/hallitus/hallitusohjelma/en.jsp

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 69 (143)



5 OULU COMMON ASSETS CASE STUDY

5.1 INTRODUCTION

The characterization of assets as “common” assets (resources) implies that such assets do not support stand-alone solutions but enable cross-sector and cross-geographical (at the scale of cities, regions, countries) applications which share common services, expertise, facilities etc. These common assets can be contributed by all constituencies involved Future Internet, Living Labs and Smart Cities.

Assets or resources of importance for innovation ecosystems may include: network infrastructures, test bed facilities, innovation labs, competence centers, available data, technologies, applications, methodologies, urban development resources etc. Assets are owned, operated and used by specific actors.

Common assets can be shared, combined and made accessible in order to facilitate user driven open innovation. Common assets identification thus lies at the basis of collaboration through partnerships across the domains of Future Internet, Living labs and Smart Cities.

objective and context

Assets include the human, technological and infrastructural assets (capital goods) that are underlying the smart city. Assets may include network infrastructures, experimentation facilities, living labs, know-how and technologies, human capital, user communities, as well as the assets embodied in the existing innovation ecosystem. This question addresses the “common assets”: the resources that are available to facilitate, when combined and made accessible, the transformation towards smart city.

This document describes assets and resources available in City of Oulu - urban innovation environment. Different types of assets are listed in tables.

In characterizing these assets different aspects have been taken into account. The actors involved: assets are be owned, operated and used by specific actors. A simple description of what constitutes this asset and also what kind of methodology they use or is provided by the asset. In some cases, where it matters, the role it plays in the innovation system is mentioned.

The task undertakes to create an inventory of resources associated to the three constituencies: Future Internet, Living Labs and Cities. Resources include testing facilities, living labs, methods and know-how, infrastructures, ICT services, user communities. The inventory focuses on the relations and synergies between these resources and how resources can be combined and used for cities’ and urban development and innovation.

overview

This document lists the identified common assets based on relevant information by city or asset owner. Document also explores initial examples of common assets and their use for smart cities innovation. Assets are listed in couple of thematic groups; ICT, eHealth, Education, Smart City, Research and Enablers

5.2 AVAILABLE ASSETS

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 70 (143)



ICT

Octobus Network

Oulu Innovation

Octopus network offers an authentic and independent wireless environment, where mobile technologies and services are developed and tested.

Facilities The core of the Octopus service is a closed operator environment - meant for developing and testing mobile applications - that functions in a nationwide Multi Access network (2G, 3G, WLAN, WiMAX). The concept includes all the equipment needed to enable the radio access or IP based connection to the closed and authentic mobile operator grade test network.

Methodology The testing environment provides Octopus' customers with a competitive advantage, which is further enhanced with comprehensive services. During this "innovation to business" process, Octopus provides its customers with training and business support, too.

Octopus Support contains all the needed configurations before testing and needed technical help and troubleshooting during the testing issues as well as extensive documentation of the testing technical environment.

Depending on the customer’s needs the testing can be conducted in Octopus’s premises or the Octopus network access can be build in customer’s premises where the customer can do the testing whenever they want. Customer can either do the testing by itself or with the help of Octopus experts

One of Octopus core partners, Oulu University Applied Sciences, has provided technical training for mobile technology since 2003. Satakunta University of Applied Sciences (SAMK) provides to Octopus Network customers a tailored NGN Laboratory training for company or institute specific needs, the course may consist of theory and practice, or practice only

More Information

www.octo.fi

Converging Networks Laboratory (CNL)

VTT, Technical Research Centre of Finland

VTT's Converging Networks Laboratory is place to innovate, prototype and test products in a future convergent network infrastructure.

Facilities VTT’s Converging Networks Laboratory (CNL) collects new radio interfaces, novel services and research prototypes in one place, in a laboratory-scale converged environment.

On its premises CNL has WCDMA/UMTS, HSDPA, fixed and mobile WiMAX (802.16 d/e) and Wi-Fi networks, which are also configurable (e.g. QoS can be changed). VoIP, IPTV and video streaming services are found at the laboratory. New services can be created either as stand-alone servers or by utilizing an application server connected to the IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS). Mobility is maintained with IP mobility management solutions.

The laboratory is physically connected to the Internet, to a local city Wi-Fi network (panOulu) with 600 access points and to a cellular Octopus 2G/3G MVNO test network allowing global exploitation.

Live MobileWiMAX testbed consists of a full WiMAX end-to-end network with sector antennas, base stations, wireless access controller, MobileIP, services, and several CPEs from PCMCIA cards to multiuser units. Mobile WiMAX testbed is located at VTT building in Oulu and the range of the WiMAX test bed is about 1km covering several ICT

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 71 (143)



companies in the Oulu Technopolis area.

The lab includes five main parts: 1. Networks. 2. IP services. 3. Enablers from the research projects. 4. Various tools from companies 5. External connections to Octopus MVNO services, panOulu public WLAN, Geant, and Funet.

Methodology The way to cooperate with CNL is to contact them and describe your testing needs. Then together with CNL experts you decide how to continue your cooperation. For example, you can reserve the WiMAX test bed for your own needs or sent software and equipment there for testing purposes.

In either case CNL offers technology consulting, roadmapping, prototyping of new services, performance measurements and testing of services, applications, products, and hardware.

VTT’s expertise includes running own wireless networks such as 3G and WiMAX and services over IP network, development of wireless services, mobility techniques, improving mobile multimedia performance, innovating human-mobile interaction and development of end-to-end QoS technologies and carrying out QoS measurements.

End to end performance competences:

• QoS and network measurements

• Measurement tools (QoSMeT)

• Performance testing and bottleneck identification

• Consulting on QoS and handover techniques, knowledge on network analyzers and simulators

• Mobility and Networks competences:

• Concept development

• Prototyping & implementation

• Mobile test beds & testing

• Consulting

• Solutions from client devices to large scale networks

Adaptive transmission competences:

• Environment for testing and development of video transmission technologies

• Tools for network monitoring

• Adaptation methods for multimedia services

Mobile multimedia competences:

• Tools for audio and video analysis

• Solutions for robust video coding and transmission

• Platform for mobile video management from production to consumption

Network testbeds competences:

• European wide access to partner testing facilities

• Research, development and testing of mobility mechanisms and mobile services

• Networking within the European research community

More Information

www.cnl.fi

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 72 (143)



Innovation Kitchen

VTT, Technical Research Centre of Finland

Facilities Innovation Kitchen is an inter-site research infrastructure which supports the research of the smart spaces. The environment is a combination of laboratory and showroom and it can viewed from different angles. Firstly, the laboratory is an open physical space where project group can meet in one place. Secondly, it is a showroom where companies and projects can show their state of the art technical demos and prototypes to possible customers, partners etc. Thirdly, the environment is place a place for meetings and especially for meetings that are held between different location (e.g. one group in Oulu and one group in Tampere)

Besides Oulu, Innovation Kitchens are located in Tampere and Espoo. In the first phase each site can see other the sites over video. Later, all sites can be cross-used in a virtual environment.

Innovation Kitchen consists of the three essential areas of technology: Device interoperability (such as NoTA), new mobile user interface technologies (including NFC and Augmented Reality) and context awareness.

Methodology Innovation kitchen is used according to the case project. The research environment can act as an extension for the own research environment of the clients. Clients can, for example, order research work for testing the interoperability of its products.

Facilities are used in developing interactive environments and inter-site communication. For example Innovation kitchen is utilized to research new and innovative ways to add the sense of presence between different parties involved in a meeting in different locations.

Tools used in Innovation kitchen are traditional office equipments like drawing inks, flip charts etc. Innovation kitchen is also place for doing experimentations with modern equipment, e.g. smart board.

More Information

http://www.vtt.fi/service/ict/innovation_kitchen.jsp

Multimedia Studio

VTT, Technical Research Center of Finland

Facilities

The Multimedia Studio offers facilities for the development and testing of networked multimedia applications and services. The studio includes laboratory facilities equipped with various kinds of multimedia equipment and Internet connections for hosting the services. Additionally, the studio contains software platforms for rapid prototyping of multimedia services and state-of-the art video streaming technology.

Additionally, its open wireless IPTV development platform provides a cost-effective and realistic environment for testing and developing video transmission technologies and services. The platform supports video delivery to mobile users in various networks, such as WLAN, WiMAX, and 3G. Furthermore, the platform includes support for managing client mobility and quality of service (QoS). The environment comprises a controlled laboratory environment including a network emulator as well as actual networks with wide coverage and regular users. Currently, the main activity in the wireless IPTV development platform is to demonstrate and evaluate the use of scalable video (SVC) streaming in future multimedia services.

Methodology The prototyping platform for the mobile multimedia services include functionalities for recording, managing and sharing multimedia content using end user mobile terminals. Videos or images can be recorded on a mobile phone – using the devices’ own camera software. Videos and images can be uploaded to VTT's content management platform, which provides tools for analyzing and managing the content. The platform

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 73 (143)



enables fast creation of visually attractive, lightweight mobile multimedia services and applications.

Multimedia studio’s customers are usually in different phases in their product development process. That’s why the studio cooperates in case-by-case manner with their customers.

Multimedia studio offers consultation and R&D services to its customers to help them get their products ready for the market. Services are usually conducted in multimedia studio’s premises but it is also possible that the studio’s experts go to customer’s premises to offer their services there.

More Information

http://www.vtt.fi/service/ict/multimedia_studio.jsp?lang=en

OWELA VTT, Technical Research Center of Finland

Facilities Owela (Open Web Lab) is an online laboratory that utilizes social media features for participatory design and open innovation

Owela is a nationwide online living lab that builds on social media features for participatory design and open innovation. It’s a place, where users, researchers and companies can meet each other. It was launched in April 2007 and is administrated by VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland.

Methodology Owela is centered around a blog-based tool called IdeaTube, with which users may browse, comment on, and rate ideas, concepts and scenarios of new products and services. Other tools for collaboration between users, developers and researchers are chat and Test lab, in which users may test new prototypes and give feedback. In addition to these qualitative research methods, quantitative online questionnaires can be used. The researchers also write a blog about social media and other themes linked to Owela.

Companies can utilize the Owela community in different stages of the innovation process:

• developing new innovations based on consumer needs

• testing early service concepts and developing them further with users

• testing and developing prototypes

• evaluating existing services

• marketing and consumer research

Owela can be combined with other user-centered design methods and utilized as a communication channel between face-to-face studies. User research can be done either publicly or, for confidential user studies, in restricted environments. Special versions for different languages can also be made easily.

Owela offers tailored project spaces to companies and

research groups. Owela spaces, which can be either public or restricted to a certain user group, have been successfully used e.g. for the following purposes: • Idea campaigns with users

• Concept validations of new products and services

• Living lab backchannel: ideas and feedback during

• user tests

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 74 (143)



• Consumer diaries (e.g. media consumption during

• a month)

• Online surveys and focus groups

• User driven participatory design of new services

More Information

http://owela.vtt.fi/owela/introduction/

HYTKE Oulu University of Applied Sciences

Facilities Wellness technology R&D center (HYTKE) offers its services to wellness companies. HYTKE provides the newest technology devices and software for the R&D and testing purposes.

Usability unit consists of a space, which includes soundproof observation room and the actual testing room. Modern recording equipments in the usability unit enable different test arrangements and the equipment can also be transferred in field circumstances.

HYTKE provides versatile collection of devices and software which can be used to measure human body and also to evaluate the measurement outcomes.

Methodology Research lecturers and planners working in the center are specialized in wellness technology R&D. The center can also use skills and knowledge of the School of Engineering in order to achieve best results.

The center can be useful in different phases of the product development process. For example rapid prototyping, usability assessments, human measuring and assessments of the reliability of the device under development are possible uses of the laboratory.

HYTKE develops new wellness technologies and cooperate with companies in order to develop new innovations and to help in applied research projects. HYTKE offers prototyping and testing services to companies, e.g. a company can give an assignment for thesis work or student project. Then the students can build a prototype or examine the usability of the product. HYTKE’s special strength is the development of real time measurement systems and mathematical analysis of measurement outcomes.

Usability unit offers support services for companies. Rental of equipments and facilities to companies’ usability experts builds the core of support service. In project level usability unit offers additional support in controlling the equipment and preparing testing arrangements, and expertise in test user and variable defining and in the analysis of the measurement outcome. In research level usability unit offers support in usability planning and training which is arranged according to project. HYTKE can also help its customer to get testers by using its own e-mail list of testers.

Human measurement equipment and software can be rented by companies on the basis of hours or days. HYTKE is also willing to offer measurement services to individual persons.

More Information

http://www.oamk.fi/tekniikka/tk/hankkeet/hankeportfolio/hytke/ (in Finnish)

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 75 (143)



E-Health

Technology Healthcare Center Oulu (TTKaakkuri)

City of Oulu, Social and Health care sector

Service In addition to the normal services of healthcare center, Technology Healthcare Center Oulu offers product testing and analyzing services to companies and research institutes. This service is called TT Kaakkuri, product testing service.

TTKaakkuri provides companies and research organizations product testing services enabling significant improvements to product’s functionality.

Benefits for the customers

• External evaluation of the products usability, suitability and required quality

• Recommendations how to improve user experience

• Technological Proof-of-concept

• Knowledge about processes and environment of healthcare

• Test results can be utilized in product development and marketing

• Movement towards co-operation with public healthcare providers

Customers can be e.g. healthcare services offering companies, universities or hospital districts. With product testing can be tested products like:

• Measurement and diagnostic products

• Self care products and services

• Hospital furniture and equipment

• Software products and services

• Pharmaceuticals

• Companies offering testing services

• Usability, processes, testing new products

Methodology Testing is conducted by toughest line-up of healthcare professionals in real healthcare environment, which gives developers lots of possibilities to test and do trials compared to the simulation environment.

In product testing service an individual testing package is tailored just for customers needs. These testing packages can vary from minor idea testing to the extensive contextual evaluation. Testing package contains normally one or more of following modules:

• User experience:

• Usability testing

o User studies

o Impact & impressiveness

o Questionnaires, interviews etc.

• Piloting

• Summing up reports

As the result from the testing the customer gets a final report including improvement ideas and recommendations for further actions.

More Information

http://www.oulu.ouka.fi/ttkaakkuri/yleisesittely/

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 76 (143)



OWI Oulu Wellness Institute Foundation

Facilities WellTech Oulu and the wellness technology laboratory HYTKE are OWI's scientific partners. In addition, on a case-dependent basis OWI carries out scientific validation with the Research Institute for Olympic Sports (KIHU) as well as with other parties.

Methodology OWI provides business development services for wellness technology companies in order to increase the success probability of launching a new business in the wellbeing industry. OWI provides mentoring, networking as well as help in accessing relevant funding in international context.

The customer needs are identified together with OWI and customer representatives. After that OWI can suggest the best solution fitting to the requirements. Based on the requirement OWI can offer following services.

Evaluation of the business idea

• Evaluation of the potential of the business idea from many points of view: business strategy, business potential, productization, conceptualization and financing.

• During the first meeting we decide which team member will assume responsibility for helping the client with the business idea, or whether some other party would be better.

• OWI Business Case criteria is used as the evaluation tool.

Development of business operations and product concepts

OWI offers help to an entrepreneur to define their products or services and conceptualize them commercially into an integrated whole with growth potential.

In practice, the assistance can take the form of sparring on the business plan, customer segmentation, or the definition of the sales and distribution network or competence needs.

The OWI Business Development tools are used to achieve these objectives.

Resources and partner network

• Entrepreneurial financing challenges approached from portfolio and roadmap view.

• OWI helps its clients to find customer and financier contacts that are essential for the potential of the business. Usually these can be found on the primary market.

• Special concentration of networks in the U.S. market, but client's primary market can be some other geographical area.

Growth strategies and operations

• In addition to OWI’s knowledge of the wellness sector, they are very familiar with the strategic and logic of growth companies, their growth models and paths as well as the venture capital or risk financing operations materially connected to the operations of growth companies.

Business coaching

• Close cooperation with, among others, Sharon C. Ballard, the developer of training courses based on Supercoach® Entrepreneurial Training.

• Encourage its clients to participate in Global Cluster coaching and to utilize the coaching on the primary market materially connected to it.

• Cooperation with the world's leading business and strategy consulting companies.

Tools:

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 77 (143)



Evaluation criteria, OWI Business Case criteria

The OWI Business Case criteria help clients to evaluate their own project and build better foundations for its success. The criteria also help OWI to structure the feedback given to the client.

In practice the criteria constitute a common language through which we enable all the parties needed for success — entrepreneurs, financiers and other stakeholder groups — to understand each other and work toward the achievement of a common objective. The evaluation criteria are made of the following elements:

1) Market opportunity, market understanding and customer value 2) Entrepreneurial leader, team and partners 3) Strategic differentiation 4) Financial plans 5) Exit plan

Systematic business creation process, OWI Business Development Tools

We encourage and guide our clients toward systematic business creation process. It has been observed in industry that a structured and systematic development model improves the quality of operations, focuses it better and improves the chances of success. In addition, it is important that the product idea and business idea fit the company's strategic objectives.

More Information

http://www.owi.fi/index.php?id=73&lang_id=1

Bioforum Oulu

City Of Oulu, Business Oulu

Objective The intent is to develop new products and services that enhance people's health and well-being and to create new business in the field.

Methodology Bioforum Oulu gathers together biotech companies, universities and R&D organisations in the Oulu region and stimulates their co-operation. Bioforum works closely with other players in the region and also carries out spearhead projects named in the Oulu Growth Agreement.

More Information

www.bioforumoulu.org/

education

Future School of Oulu

City of Oulu

The School of the Future is not merely a building with fancy technology, but rather an ideology with which the school can meet the challenges of the 21st century and the changing world, and is thus able to offer pupils the skills they will need in the future. The role of the teacher, leadership, support systems, technology and learning environments are being developed.

Projects The Learning Environments for the Future project

The virtual learning environment that will be created will be as similar as possible to the authentic operational learning environment. The learning environment under development is like a 3D user interface to pupils' personal information, Internet-based information search and their learning resources, where they can log in by using available technology. The Learning Environment for the Future will be implemented by building a future school facility that is a virtual picture of the future environment,

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 78 (143)



such as a common entrance hall or a theme classroom. The facility will be provided with tools for learning and interaction.

InnoAula as a Learning Environment for the Future project

InnoAula as the Learning Environment for the Future project was implemented in an existing school building in Pohjankartano by constructing 1) the hall 2) the meeting area and 3) theme classrooms. The idea was that all areas in the building are learning areas and designed with educational needs in mind. The school's values and functional framework have served as the guidelines for the choice of furniture, lighting and technology. The central hall with its innovative solutions is the communal hub of action. Individual skills can be developed in the modern subject classrooms on the first floor and at the learning points situated in the corridor.

The idea of the project was to create opportunities for learning in all areas of the entire school building; the areas were furnished and equipped to provide the pupils with a comfortable, relaxing and functional learning environment. This was the first actual opportunity to realize the architectural plans for a learning environment. The project utilized a lot of the knowledge supplied by the international School of the Future network.

The InnoAula project has taken a long-term approach to the development of cross-subject teaching and the use of social media in education. During the project, users, pupils and teachers participate in the planning process with experts of pedagogy and architecture.

e-Learning project

The e-Learning project focuses on the development of the operational culture of the upper secondary school education and the creation of shared operational models for various learning situations. New technology and operational models tested in distant teaching are applied.

The educational development project involves support for the learning process, reinforcement of teachers' role and a sense of community. It will create shared regional operational models for the planning and organization of interactive, proactive and communal study modules. Testing the study modules is also an important part of the project.

E-Learning for the upper secondary school is developed in line with the school's own objectives. The project aims to improve the quality of teaching with the help of various technological solutions, learner-centered learning culture, opportunities for in-depth learning and better accessibility of learning and teaching.

The Development of the Learning Environments project

The Development of Learning Environments project produced architectural plans to show how the traditional learning environment can better facilitate the learning in the future as well as models for the transformation of the operational culture based on new solutions concerning the use of space, technology and learning.

The project is conducted in ten Smart Schools. Each school has its individual approach to the future and is a forerunner in its own chosen sector.

Developing learning games

Designing a good educational game requires both technological and pedagogical expertise. Knowledge in both these areas should be linked because our information society is increasingly becoming a gaming society. The computer game of the future is an educational game.

The Learning Environments for the Future project is founded on long-term and focused development work of learning environments. Game-like learning environments have been created in earlier projects such as Seikkailu Oulun linnassa (The Adventure in Oulu Castle) and Snellman.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 79 (143)



Mobile Learning

The primary tool of the School of the Future is a mobile learning environment. Binder is a mobile learning environment which supports learning in schools. A pupil makes an observation, such as a piece of text, image, sound, video or an interview, and saves it on their camera phone. These observations are positioned by GPS, 2D or RFID. The media is then sent to a computer using a real-time data transfer connection and can be used by the pupil in their work. Observations can also be shared using social media type applications between selected people or displayed as a stream of images.

Facilities The School of the Future will continue to have classrooms for traditional lessons, but there will also be areas for project learning, group work and individual learning – a perfect combination of open and non-open space.

Comprehensive school of Ritaharju

Comprehensive school of Ritaharju is one of the schools of Microsoft’s worldwide Innovative School Program (ISP). Schools of ISP form a worldwide network of schools, where specialists share knowledge and develop national and international culture of schools. As part of international network of schools Comprehensive school of Ritaharju is lead developer. Cooperation with Microsoft and other international and national partners enables front end development possibilities and worldwide visibility.

Pupils, teachers and auxiliary staff working in the 'nest' form a learning community. The pedagogical framework relies on investigative, project- or event-based learning methods, learning from creative problem-solving or communal learning processes.

The usage of space and activities are based on an open learning environment which utilizes movable walls and flexible structures. It is also important that small-scale lessons can be arranged anywhere in the area. In a good school environment, furniture and technology are designed keeping the users' needs in mind, and these are designed to work together as effortlessly as possible.

The main points of these two spaces will be presented in virtual 3D game-like learning environment. New kind of learning will be supported by simulations and mobile learning possibilities. It is meant to be believable realization from virtual learning environment and possibilities it holds in the development of future Internet.

Oulujoki Primary School

Oulujoki Primary School is one of the ten developer schools in the Oulu School of the Future program. Key areas of development at Oulujoki are co-teaching and personal Tablet PCs. In addition, mobile devices and the Binder mobile learning environment have been introduced. The aim is to develop models that allow schools, teachers and pupils to meet the challenges of learning and work in the future. A School of the Future emphasizes individuality on one hand and community on the other. Above all, a School of the Future is tailored for pupils by the pupils themselves.

Individual learning is enabled by the personal device provided for each pupil. This device withholds a learning experience which is not restricted by time or place. There is no need for a pupil to share this device with others, which enables personal access to information. The wireless panOulu network and shared learning environments offer opportunities for learning through collective activities in any learning environment: museums, science learning centre, local libraries, surrounding countryside, the home, hobbies. Learning and working is no longer dependent on school hours but offer a virtual extension for pupils outside of school.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 80 (143)



Each pupil in the Oulujoki School pilot class has access to a personal tablet PC which they use at school and at home. The pilot has now been extended to the next year group. These two years form a “learning community" where four classes, four classrooms and four class teachers can benefit from co-teaching and use the school’s learning environments flexibly. The “nest principle” breaks the professional autonomy of teachers and classrooms and leads schools towards a whole new operational culture. Teaching is reorganized to move away from the subject-based curriculum towards a more theme- and event-based, investigative learning.

To support this work, the school is provided with a 21st century learning environment with teaching technology and wireless Internet connection. Furnishing still poses several challenges and opportunities for development.

Pohjankartano Lower Secondary School

A Living Lab and democentre type environment was constructed for one school as part of the innovative teaching services and learning environments of the future product development process. This environment forms a multi-purpose ”village” for people in the Pohjankartano area and is used by the lower and upper secondary schools, library, music conservatoire, the Oulu-opisto (adult education centre) and various fair and event organizers. The initiative aims to develop learning environments by building bridges between traditional and virtual learning environments.

The target has been to design a 21st century learning environment where different pedagogical models and practices can be put into action. The purpose of the environment has been to reflect the ideology and development vision of the School of the Future. The aim has been to take the practical use of the environment as a starting point in creating an innovative entity where the lighting, audiovisual presentation, furniture, technology and versatile use of space and learning environment is taken into consideration. This environment leads the way for the broader development of learning environments and acts as a model for renovation projects and new construction projects.

Monitoring learning research project is conducted in Pohjankartano School. Aim of the project is to research and develop a system based on educational technology and learning theory to examine pupils’ and teachers’ behavior in classroom situations. Technology aids in modeling and measuring the efficiency of a learning event and in producing information to develop teaching methods.

The equipment to support the research project was acquired as a part of the InnoAula Learning Environment of the future program. It is operational and used for basic research; it is hoped to be beneficial regarding the future research on learning in both traditional and virtual learning environments. The equipment includes professional camera systems, recording systems to measure prosodic features of speech and heart rate monitors. The multimodal analysis based on these parameters will be further developed by application and research. The aim is to be able to apply the research data quicker than with the earlier systems. In addition to the basic research, the benefits of the equipment and other services on the same platform will be examined.

Methodology Smart Schools

Smart Schools lead the way for other schools by testing the best practices and creating models for other schools to apply. A group of ten schools were chosen, based on their applications, to support and carry out the School of the Future program at a local level.

The Smart Schools network focuses on improving and remodeling

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 81 (143)



pedagogic practices around the skills of the 21st century learner. Each school forms its vision for the future from its own standpoint. Pilot schools develop ways to work together as a school community, support different learning styles, organize instruction that is not restricted by year groups, improve cooperation between teachers and engage pupils in practical learning.

There are two types of cooperation between businesses and the public sector:

1) Businesses in the surrounding community must play a larger role in the schools operations and development. Businesses are a natural partner for defining the skills that today’s pupils will need in the work environment in 10-20 years time.

2) Mutual development projects in which the goals outlined in project plans or the framework set by mutual agreements define what has been agreed, are carried out with businesses. Development projects offer a flexible opportunity to follow a common path and for all stakeholders to learn something useful. It is a win-win situation.

More Information

http://edu.ouka.fi/~koulunet/futus/

TOY, Future Virtual Learning Environment

City of Oulu

Facility The Learning Environments for the Future project creates virtual learning environments in the RealXtend virtual world. The technical implementation is based on the open-source game engine designed for building virtual environments and a platform for virtual worlds.

The Learning Environments for the Future project is in the core of the development of the future school. The operational culture that is based on the development of traditional learning environments, designs of architectural models, the InnoAula project and tests conducted in the Smart Schools will be transformed into a virtual one by the creation of a new-generation Internet-based operating environment and by integrating electronic user services.

The virtual learning environment that will be created will be as similar as possible to the authentic operational learning environment. The learning environment under development is like a 3D user interface to pupils' personal information, Internet-based information search and their learning resources, where they can log in by using available technology. The Learning Environment for the Future will be implemented by building a future school facility that is a virtual picture of the future environment, such as a common entrance hall or a theme classroom. The facility will be provided with tools for learning and interaction.

Methodology In the future TOY can be offered for companies as a platform to test their products in the virtual environment. A great advantage in using the TOY as a test platform is that tests are conducted by using end-users. Using end-users in product development and evaluation will offer companies a chance to make products that customers really want.

More Information

http://edu.ouka.fi/~koulunet/futus/

LearnLab University Of Oulu

Facilities LearnLab is a laboratory, which includes observation room and the actual

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 82 (143)



testing room. Modern recording equipment used in the laboratory enable different test arrangements and the equipment can also be transferred to conduct field trials.

LearnLab provides versatile collection of devices and software which can be used to measure human body, e.g. eye movement and heart rate and also to demonstrate and evaluate the measurement outcomes.

Methodology The research activities of the Learning Research Laboratory (LearnLab) focus on the relationships between learning, development and emotions. The research program "Learning, Development and Emotions" examines the development of and connections between learning and emotions from the theoretical level to the level of classroom activities. The research program is divided into three main groups: “Development of theoretical framework”, “Multimodal analysis of learning and emotions in dynamic social interaction”, and “Development of perception”.

Research project of theoretical framework focuses on the neuronal basis of the learning process, and the perception of affective words in children of various ages. The project is executed in co-operation with the Institute of Psychology (Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow). The experiments are carried out by the LearnLab at Oulu TeacherTraining School (University of Oulu). The broader research aim is to connect and interpret the results using the framework of functional systems theory.

Research project of multimodal analysis of learning and emotions in dynamic social interaction focuses on identifying emotions at individual level, in triangular groups, and in classroom situations. In addition, the studies contribute to methodological development of emotion research.

Research project of development of perception is divided into two subprojects.

1. Perceptual bias and age focuses on the perceptual lateral bias in auditory and visual space, and how it is balanced via top-down attentional control across the life span.

2. Visuomotor development and visual field defect concentrates on the development of visuomotor skills of children using different kinds of visual optical illusions.

The SmartSchool-project, which is in the initial planning stage, will examine the manifestation of emotions in teaching and learning processes. The project is related to the plans of the City of Oulu to construct a unified comprehensive school in Ritaharju (Microsoft School). The aim of the plan is to develop a prototype of a future classroom, which enables the study on learning and classroom activities with the help of the current technology.

In addition to its own research in the future the LearnLab is planning to offer its facilities for companies to conduct product testing and usability analysis.

More Information

http://www.oulu.fi/ktk/kasope/english/research/

Research and smart city

Ubiquitous (UBI) Oulu

University of Oulu, MediaTeam

Ubiquitous Oulu is a prototype of a future ubiquitous city which is being built by the multidisciplinary UBI (UrBan Interactions) Program, coordinated by the University of Oulu, and the City of Oulu. Ubiquitous city stands for an urban space in which information technology is being harnessed invisibly and effectively for the use of processes taking place in the space. The objective is to create an urban environment in which better services are being

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 83 (143)



offered to the people of the city.

Infrastructure The infrastructure that is being built into the city centre of Oulu in 2009-2011 lays the foundation for ubiquitous Oulu. The infrastructure consists of large public displays (UBI-displays) and different software and wireless networks.

UBI-displays

A key component of the hotspot is the 57” landscape LCD panel with full HD resolution. The panel is protected by hardened safety glass. Behind the glass is a projected capacitive touch screen foil. UBI-displays are installed in several locations in downtown Oulu. In Ubiquitous Oulu, the large public displays are used in a new way; in addition to the traditional broadcast channel, they simultaneously offer also an interactive browsing view. This creates a challenge in both realizing the interactivity and dividing the dynamic display between different applications.

The UBI-hotspot is equipped with a set of additional hardware components. A loudspeaker is implemented by a transducer that transforms the front cover to a loudspeaker. A NFC reader is attached behind a panel in the front of the case and two cameras are integrated to the top frame of the case. panOULU Bluetooth, panOULU WLAN and panOULU WSN (Wireless Sensor Network) access points are placed inside a special weatherproof equipment box inside the DID case, and their antennas are integrated into the roof of the casing.

panOulu WLAN

panOULU WLAN is a wireless city network realized with the IEEE 802.11 WLAN technology and it is provided by the panOULU consortium. It offers an open and free Internet connection within its coverage area. PanOULU WLAN network has ca 1200 WLAN access points in Oulu and eight nearby towns. They offer an efficient short range data transfer which enables a functioning interaction with the Ubiquitous Oulu.

panOULU BT

panOULU BT is a network of Bluetooth access points that is currently being built.

In the vision of Ubiquitous Oulu, there are several WPAN (Wireless Personal Area Network) points realised with Bluetooth access points in the city centre of Oulu. The points offer useful services that can be used completely free of charge with a mobile device and a Bluetooth connection. For example, a restaurant can offer its menu, a bus stop its timetable, a pedestrian street shop and tourist information and shopping centre discount coupons.

A prototype service that is being provided with the panOULU BT network is BlueInfo.

panOULU WSN

panOULU WSN is a network of access points of Wireless Sensor Network (WSN) that is being built.

panOULU WSN network’s access points are based on IEEE 802.15.4 technology and with a 6LoWPAN protocol stack, they offer a multi-hop, half-duplex data transfer for sensors with a low energy consumption. panOULU WSN access points route the data collected by the sensors forward to a GSN (Global Sensor Network) server. The GSN server saves

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 84 (143)



the data and refines it forward for the client.

The access points installed in June 2009 use a 2.4 GHz frequency band. In autumn 2009, the access points are updated to use a frequency band of 868 MHz, which is more suitable for the transfer of the measurement data of low-power sensors. A prototype service provided with the panOULU WSN network is UBI-AMI.

UBI Middleware

The different components of Ubiquitous Oulu, the large displays, sensors, users’ own devices and the networks they use form an extensive decentralized system. It is organized with the help of UBI middleware which hides the differences between components and offers open homogenous interfaces for the use of different resources of the system. This is how, in the future, the entire community can make good use of the arising infrastructure in their own research and development actions.

A central part of the middleware is the asynchronous communications based on the publish-subscribe model which enables the communication between reactive and proactive programs in decentralized environments. The publish-subscribe model is broadly used in realizing dynamic systems. Typically in these systems, the components are not necessarily known in advance but the communications system routes the messages in decentralized environments according to the conditions set by the subscriber or the terms set in the application servers. Therefore, this model conforms well as a building block for the applications of ubiquitous information technology. An important part of the communications solution is the content-based routing of the messages which enables the accurate allocation of information for the subscribers. For example, a message can be directed into a certain logical or physical space, such as to all users in a market place who have been there for ten minutes. Content- and context-based actions enable new types of interactive applications.

Services The potential functionality of Ubiquitous Oulu and the possibilities offered by the UBI Displays, sensor networks and mobile applications are being presented with the help of prototype services developed in the UBI Program.

UBI Portal

The UBI Portal is web portal which can be browsed with a touch screen display. Any webpage or -application can be added as to the portal, and the applications can be defined display-specifically.

UBI Mobile

Mobile devices play an important role in the interaction between the user and ubiquitous Oulu. A Bluetooth-enabled phone acts as an identification tool so that the user can be offered more personal services and applications.

UBI-AMI

The UBI-AMI (Advanced Metering Infrastructure) service is being executed with the help of panOULU WSN network. The UBI-AMI sensors collect data on electricity consumption, temperature and lighting. By using the panOULU WSN network, the measurement data is transferred to a server which provides the measurement data in a refined form to the user via a web site. A plug sensor measures the electricity consumption, temperature and lighting.

An example view of the web site of a user of the UBI-AMI service: First, the user defines the floor plan of his/her apartment in which the sensors are placed. The measurement data collected by the sensors can be reviewed individually and separately on different time spans. This way the user can have real-time information on the energy consumption of

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 85 (143)



different devices.

The unique quality of the UBI-AMI service is the possibility to control the sensors which is based on the half-duplex data transfer of the panOULU WSN network. This quality enables the function with which devices attached to a certain sensor can be turned off via a web site.

UBI Channel

The UBI Channel repeats a playlist which is ten minutes long at the most and consists of forty spots at the most. A spot can be either a video or a high resolution image.

When the UBI Display is in the passive mode, the entire screen is reserved for the UBI Channel. In the interactive mode the UBI Channel uses a quarter of the screen.

The UBI Channel is used for non-commercial communications of the City of Oulu and non-commercial actors of the third sector, as well as for commercial advertising. If necessary, the playlist of the UBI Channel can be defined display-specifically.

StreetGallery

UBI Displays' StreetGallery is a digital art gallery. The exhibitions displayed in the gallery can consist of traditional photographs and videos. It is also possible to view different kinds of interactive exhibitions, thanks to UBI displays' touch screen and mobile services.

The exhibitions in StreetGallery usually last for one month. It is also possible to view multiple exhibitions simultaneously. Displaying an exhibition is completely free for the artist.

Methodology The opportunities that the new infrastructure offers are being demonstrated with prototype services. Several small-scale demos have been created in the UBI Program. Their purpose is to illustrate and test the functionality of, for example, an individual technology, application sketch or user interface solution. A part of the services are integrated into large-scale pilots that illustrate the true functionality of a ubiquitous city. The first pilot called UBI Pilot 2009 was organized in the summer of 2009 and it extended from June to August. The next pilot will start in June 2010.

One of the main themes of Ubiquitous Oulu is openness. The infrastructure is offered as an open horizontal resource for the use of the entire community, which hopefully will stimulate ideation and development of new services. In order to stimulate the birth of new services, the UBI Program also releases the software created in it according to the principle of open source code.

panOulu methodologies

The large coverage area of the panOULU network and the resources supporting R&D activities enable versatile development and testing of applications and services utilizing WLAN technology in true environment of use. In order to conduct product testing a company should contact panOulu experts to further discuss about the possibilities to utilize panOulu network.

Tools used in panOulu include:

Centralized monitoring system

The monitoring system is an in-house software, which collects a wide range of statistics from individual access points, the whole network and the devices using the network. You find examples at the Usage statistics page.

Advanced IP network analysis system

The analysis system comprises of probes collecting packet data and the

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 86 (143)



software used for analyzing the packet data. There are three different types of probe: the core probe collecting the headers of all packets routed via the main switch of the panOULU network, a remote probe collecting the headers of packets routed via a selected interface and a WLAN probe collecting WLAN packets at a desired location. The packet data is analyzed with the Tia tool provided by Clarified Networks Ltd. Tia allows, among other things, visualization of the sequences and causal relationships of multiple packet flows collected from multiple sources.

SIP infrastructure

The Operator Engine provides a versatile platform for implementing VoIP, presence and instant messaging services.

Mobile IP infrastructure

The Mobile IP technology enables seamless mobility between different data networks. Moving from one network to another is automatic and does not require any intervention from the user or cause any interruptions in the data traffic.

More Information

http://www.ubioulu.fi/en/home

V-Lab University of Oulu

Facilities V-LAB is a part of an international testing and innovation environment. The V-LAB project is an important part of the Living Lab development in Northern Finland.

The V-LAB experience and observation room can be utilized by a wide range of multidisciplinary research programs and it is excellent for showing demonstrations.

V-LAB utilizes the Octopus test network. The SIM cards required by the network are provided free of charge for research purposes and you can reserve from V-LAB. A small amount of wireless terminals (Nokia 770 Internet tablets, Nokia N73 mobile phones) are at the disposal of the project. They are also free of charge for research purposes and can be reserved from V-LAB.

The V-LAB suite has a fully-fledged videoconferencing infrastructure equipped with modern group-ware IP-videoconferencing codecs and accessories. The V-LAB premises can be used by all research groups working at the university. In addition, as V-LAB is a part of the Octopus Network, Octopus customers can also utilize V-LAB.

Methodology The premises can be used for observing and analyzing pretests, proof of concept tests, and use case simulations before real-life testing. For example the applications can be installed in V-LAB, then tested with a limited number of test users in a safe and secure environment, and finally analyzed for further development. The V-LAB premises can also be used for setting up research results demonstrations and for observing and collecting data in group collaboration situations.

In order to achieve best benefits and solution for cooperation a company should contact and discuss with V-Lab’s experts. Together both parties are able to identify the test need and testing can be done in more reasonable and efficient way.

Community Innowiki

The user community can contribute to the innovation process significantly. V-lab’s solution is an open, or partially open, internet based environment where users can present new ideas, make comments, and develop innovations with minimal restrictions. Innowiki combines these functionalities with a user-friendly implementation, thus creating a highly attractive and intellectually appealing concept. The Innowiki could, for

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 87 (143)



example, be used to provide powerful information repository and to network resources. For more information see www.innowiki.fi.

More Information

http://vlab.oulu.fi/

Center for Internet Excellence, CIE

University Of Oulu

Objective CIE drives co-creation of next generation internet technologies, appliances and services. CIE aims to capture and create internet-driven growth opportunities and value by combining cutting-edge research innovations with agile new business creation processes. Despite CIE’s highly global nature, the local cooperation and networks form a basis for its operations. CIE strives for growth, business possibilities and employment in the Oulu area. Internet research is one of the focus areas of the Oulu Innovation Alliance agreement, and CIE the center of excellence to drive that.

Methodology CIE aims to work across boundaries, i.e. its projects are multi-disciplinary. Its main focus is in technology but closely linked with application development, usability and social sciences. In other words, CIE work at the edges of the Internet.

Secondly, it drives for the Living Lab approach to obtain user-driven innovations by involving individuals outside the traditional product and service creation professions. This empowers ordinary people to experiment and contribute for the Future Internet.

Finally, CIE strongly focus its energy on the development of new business opportunities based on the Internet. CIE’s aim is to create internet-driven growth opportunities by combining cutting-edge innovations with agile business creation. To drive this, CIE has developed the “Turning Ideas into Business” (TIB) process. The TIB process offers you the network for turning your idea into business:

Innovators

• Coaching by entrepreneurs, researches and academica

• Market research, feasibility studies, IPR expertise

• Funding connections, including business angels and venture capitalists

Companies

• Market research, feasibility studies, IPR expertise

• Funding connections, including business angels and venture capitalists

• Connections to students with business potential

Investors

• Access to Internet-based business opportunities and ideas

• Connections to companies with growth potential

• Researcher and student contacts

Students

• Experience and opportunities in real business cases

• Earn credits through practical assignments

• Connections to existing/new high-tech companies and entrepreneurs

More Information

www.cie.fi

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 88 (143)



OULLabs Oulu Urban Living Labs, University of Oulu

Objective OULLabs is established to support the region to further utilize the existing infrastructures and networks. OULLabs targets to develop and test utilization of user‐centric knowledge for better appliances and services for inhabitants, as well as to expedite growth of businesses in the Oulu region.

The aim is to create an active environment which drives co‐creation of user‐centric services supported by tailored research, development and solution creation. OULLabs drives for the Living Lab approach to obtain user‐driven innovations to empower ordinary people to experiment and co‐create new innovations for better living.

Methodology OULLabs acts as “one‐stop‐shop” testing and test bed service provider with project and resource management. It also offers mutual marketing and communication services and opens a window of opportunity to national and international projects.

By creating a “one‐stop‐shop” for the entire service system, OULLabs service will ease the way to reach end‐users for user‐driven innovation or service and appliance development. OULLabs brings together living labs, companies, public sector, social user groups and individual users.

More Information

www.oullabs.fi

NorthRULL Northern Rural-Urban Living Lab, University of Oulu

Objective The initiative, NorthRULL, has been launched by a set of northernmost regions of Finland and, within them, by a Triple Helix constellation of the Regional Councils and development agencies, the two universities and the HEI network, and the key enterprise clusters. The formulation “Northern Rural-Urban Living Lab” states our intention to experiment with, learn from, and put into effect forms of innovative interplay between ICT-intensive growth- hubs on the one hand and rural areas on the other. In the latter, three fourths of the 700,000 people of northern Finland live on about 133 000 square kilometers. It is their economic and demographic vitality as well as sustainable growth and new regional development practices that NorthRULL aims to enhance. The entire approach builds upon the strengths and challenges of the rural peripheral areas.

Aims of NorthRULL

• Ensure the vitality of northern rural areas through offering a new, integrated, user-centered approach to innovative economic and social development

• Study and enablement of the key factors of sustainable development (everyday life and culture, services; innovation processes; business, internationalization)

• Creation of an open innovation environment offering relative benefits / unexpected advantages for new ventures in rural areas, based on local strengths

• Implementation of long-term research with multidisciplinary approach to user, context, experience and innovation, supporting the above objectives

Methodology Objectives are to be achieved by combining cross-disciplinarily with the extant know-how and experience into a holistic approach to the implementation of the Lisbon strategy. NorthRULL will proceed in two main areas of activity, (1) health-related e-services and (2) international tourism industry. In both of them, it will explore the possibilities to set up

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 89 (143)



open innovation systems and improve the management of innovation networks in the North. Tests and development of services and products takes place in real conditions with real end users.

More Information

http://www.northrull.fi/

MediaTeam Oulu

University of Oulu

Objective MediaTeam conducts research on the features, use, and applications of multimedia and digital media types (image, sound, video, text) in information and communication systems. Its research combines different areas of information and telecommunications technology, with a special focus on mobility and wireless features as well as future generations of communication technology. Mediateam’s main fields of interest are image and video processing, language and audio technology, information hiding as a security solution, mobile services, packet networks, and distributed computing.

Methodology The core of research comprises of innovations. The innovation process begins with basic research producing new information and proceeds to development of commercial products and their applications. The results are utilized and combined in applied research, the purpose of which is to demonstrate the added value incorporated into the chosen application by the new scientific knowledge. The results of applied research can further be utilized in new commercial products. MediaTeam operates in the first half of this innovation chain, but also takes part in implementing the results with the companies in the field.

More Information

www.mediateam.oulu.fi/

CWC Center for Wireless Communications, University of Oulu

Objective Iterative and integrated development of future wireless communication systems requires multidisciplinary fundamental research covering all the relevant layers of the Open System Interface (OSI) model as well as several other related technologies. Hence, long-term research necessitates understanding all major areas - radio channels, transceiver techniques, physical layer techniques, medium access control & radio resource management, radio network topologies and internetworking over wireless systems. This research paradigm calls for a new type of thinking - a broadening of the expertise of individual researchers.

The most important future key areas that shape the research environment that we tackle are:

• Wireless networking theory on a multitude of novel network topologies.

• New network control paradigms.

• System adaptation based on environment discovery.

• Imaginative utilization and management of radio resources.

• Better integration of physical layer expertise with higher layer optimization.

• Utilization of programmable radio platforms in the physical layer and MAC research.

RF and baseband processing as well as antenna research for novel radio access technologies and cost-efficient transceiver equipment.

A paradigm shift in internetworking introduced by mobile applications.

A single operating radio link is already well understood in scientific terms. Hence, increasing efforts in future research will be directed to where the

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 90 (143)



next capacity increases are awaiting radio resource management and wireless networking.

Methodology CWC’s research has two dimensions – fundamental long-term research and applied research - that allow the development of more robust theory for customers' needs which can be tested in “the real world”. The scope of long-term research is 10 to 15 years whereas the results of applied research projects are typically utilized in industry in less than 5 years.

CWC’s fundamental research serves as the basis for developing the necessary technical competences that include

• channel modeling and measurements

• radio frequency technologies

• communication signal processing algorithms and architectures for wireless networks

• future broadband transmission and radio access network techniques

• wireless system planning and resource control

• wireless sensor networks

CWC’s short term applied research is typically funded by industry and the European Commission whereas fundamental technology research is carried out in projects funded by Tekes together with industry and the Academy of Finland.

CWC is constantly updating its research strategy in cooperation with industry, and thus CWC has been able to produce relevant technology competences that support the up to date needs of companies, other research sponsors and the global research community.

CWC applied research activities are divided into three major areas: Broadband Wireless Access, Short Range Communications, and Security and Defence.

• BWA (Broadband Wireless Access) research area conducts research on future broadband wireless solutions such as next generation mobile cellular systems (3G evolution versions, 4G) and evolution versions of wireless access, e.g. WiMAX and WLAN.

• SRC (Short Range Communications) research area studies solutions for mobile phones, home appliances, eWellness, industrial automation, environmental measurements (embedded sensor networks) and security. In the future, activities will be focused on MAC layer optimization and accurate positioning techniques.

• S&D (Security and Defence) research area conducts research on next generation wireless solutions for defence, security, crisis management, disaster recovery, public safety and civil authorities. Common factors in all these areas are, e.g., increased requirements for flexibility, robustness and autoconfigurability.

More Information

http://www.cwc.oulu.fi/home/

Digia Oy Private Company

Facilities Digia brings user experience into reality through its extensive experience and competence in usability and user interface design.

Usability test laboratory is a space which includes test equipment and monitoring equipment to measure human body during the test situation. Testing results can be analyzed with the software which is connected to test room equipment. Testing situation can also be observed behind the window.

Methodology Digia has conducted user experience projects for mobile, web and desktop solutions since 2001 for handset industry players, operators and

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 91 (143)



enterprises worldwide helping its customers bring their products successfully into the market with the right features and compelling usability and user interface.

Digia offers its customers services according to customer’s products and target group. End users are involved in different phases of the product’s life cycle. Depending on the product the end users can be involved even in the ideation phase. In Oulu Digia has its own list of about 200 test users who can be used in evaluating user experience. Usually these test users are rewarded with money or gift vouchers.

Concept design is conducted by studying the end users' behavior in their own environment with selected focus and methods to understand, define and create product concepts. Methods used include:

Interviews Observations Diary method Web surveys & questionnaires Brainstorming workshops Focus groups Contextual Design Personas

Digia provides graphics design services for appealing and enjoyable visual experiences for any device or environment in order to ensure customer brand supported visual elements and consistent look and feel. Graphics design services include icon design, visual design, web graphics, flash animations and movies, and visualization of materials supporting brand and graphical guidelines

UI prototypes are created to support user experience design by providing an interactive simulation of the designed concept. Benefits from the UI prototypes are better results in usability tests, easier communication of the design in the early stages of development and prototypes that can be used as a show-case of the concept.

With selected focus and methods Digia studies and tests the product's usability to define concrete down-to-earth improvement suggestions for identified usability problems to create better product.

Methods used to evaluate usability include:

Usability laboratory tests Comparative usability analysis Web surveys & questionnaires Heuristic evaluations Expert evaluations Focus groups Interviews International user research

Digia provides also user-centered and usability-verified user interface designs for mobile, web and desktop. Benefits from UI design are blueprint for successful product creation, improved visibility for implementation effort estimations and increased engineering development and testing productivity.

More Information

www.digia.com

Grant4com Private Company

Facilities Testing can be conducted at the customer's premises, using local test laboratories or utilizing Grant4com’s accredited testing partners’ laboratories that cover all possible needs within the industry.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 92 (143)



Wireless products (RF, EMC, Protocol, SAR, SIM, Audio etc.)

• EMC testing

• Safety testing

• Reliability testing

• Interoperability testing

• Field testing

Grant4com can handle regulatory approvals and certifications covering over 100 countries and additional certificates for following areas;

• BT

• USB

• GCF

• PTCRB

• Wimax

• Wi-Fi

• RFID

• CTIA

• RoHs

• Medical MDD

• Auto industry

• Home electronics etc Methodology The customer needs are identified together with Grant4Com and

customer representatives. After that Grant4Com can present the best solution fitting to the requirements. By carefully mapping the needed services in the project; planning, management and cost estimations can be done effectively. Grant4Com provides services separately or offers a whole range of services to get products ready for the market, making the development process one step easier for the customer.

Grant4Com offers:

• Project planning, coordination, managing and ending

• Testing activities

• Regulatory approvals world-wide

• Certification services (GCF, PTCRB, CTIA, WI-Fi, Wimax, BT, USB)

Grant4com consulting services include separate services related to a specific area in a project. Grant4Com can also offer consultation for entire product families depending on each case.

More Information

www.grant4com.fi/

enablers

BusinessOulu City of Oulu

Objective The first step when considering investing or opening a new business in Finland and in the Oulu Region in particular is to contact Invest in Oulu team. Free of charge and in full confidentiality, we offer direct assistance

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 93 (143)



to individuals, corporations and other organizations interested in access the business markets. We help you in your business decisions by providing valuable information on existing business opportunities and getting you in contact with business partners, skilled workforce, grants and regional funding, different business service providers and local authoritities, as well operating facility providers.

For any inquiries you may have about opening an office in Oulu, Finland, please feel welcome to contact us or send us email at info[at]businessoulu.com

Methodology We organize and supervise:

• Access to Networks: We will provide you with a general introduction to the Oulu region and facts and figures about the business environment, competences, infrastructure, labour force and educational institutions etc. We will set up and arrange meetings with targeted prospect companies and find the best professionals to help you with market entry.

• Access to Funding: Several sources of support including EU funding are available to inward investors and businesses of Oulu including cash grants, business development, training and investment aid. As an example Tekes, the Finnish funding Agency for technology and innovation finances R&D projects. This funding is intended for challenging and innovative projects potentially leading to global success stories.

• Access to HR: We regularly work with recruiters and head hunters to assist our clients. Oulu is known for highly educated workforce and qualified engineers.

• Identification of M&A targets: Long-listing potential Finnish acquisition targets is our everyday work and we can help you to identify the ideal opportunities. Our services provide extensive guidance on market entry strategy and we can answer your questions on the requirements for different types of business entities, registration and how the Finnish taxation system works.

• Identification of research, development and innovation resources: We will get you in contact with the most appropriate leading R&D organizations in the region.

More Information

http://www.investinoulu.com

Oulu Inspires – Innovation Strategy project,

City of Oulu

Objective International business competitiveness will speed up

Local innovations are cultivated into business success stories. This is why particular emphasis is placed on actions supporting success in the international competition.

Globalization, which is progressing at a fast pace, is utilized by obtaining the competence and production opportunities needed in different fields via international networks. Sustainable business ideas must be discovered in both the national and international markets.

The strategy recognizes all business branches as potential areas of innovation and growth. The preconditions of success of growth-oriented multi-domain businesses are promoted. In addition, new business potential is being sought for in the interface of different domains and technologies, new kinds of service products as well as within trade and services.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 94 (143)



All players are committed to a common goal

The goal of the Oulu Inspires – Innovation Strategy is to create a common vision on long-term, strategic development needs in our operating environment encompassing businesses, research and education institutes as well as the public sector, and to target joint efforts on the selected focus areas.

The players are committed to investing and allocating resources in the choices made, and they are ready to change their current operating models and roles, if necessary.

Enthusiastic implementation and active follow-up

The aim of the strategy is to make the Oulu innovation system one of the best in the world. The functionality of the system is monitored by using indicators measuring regional resources, innovation activities and economic results.

Clear, measurable numeric goals are set for the actions included in the strategy, and their progress is closely monitored. If needed, the strategy is updated annually and its results are reported in a clear and transparent way.

Methodology Growing and successful companies through cooperation

The contents of the Oulu Inspires – Innovation Strategy have been compiled of key development activities from business success and growth point of view. A well covering number of top-management representatives of local companies were interviewed for this purpose. In addition, the process has involved representatives of key public organizations, whose role has been to pinpoint the actions that ensure other vital prerequisites to business competitiveness. The Innovation Strategy is managed by Oulu Innovation Ltd.

Oulu Innovation Ltd. is in charge of managing, monitoring and maintaining the Oulu Inspires – Innovation Strategy. It is a development company owned by key actors in the Oulu region promoting the development and competitiveness of growth companies in the area.

From spearhead projects to impressive entities

Players implementing the programs are committed to preparing the spearhead projects in accordance with the program’s focus areas, with the aim of forming entireties in which the allocated resources have as much effect as possible.

Funding organizations to support strategic goals

Funding organizations will support the implementation of the strategy by guiding funds towards the strategy’s focus areas and, when needed, by obligating different operators to engage in cooperation negotiations when project entities are being formed during application rounds. In the Oulu region, application rounds of the EU competition and employment target program will primarily be focused on entireties formed in accordance with the Innovation Strategy.

More Information

http://www.ouluinspiroi.fi/english/index.asp

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 95 (143)



5.3 COLLABORATION MODELS

Oulu Urban Living Labs (OULLabs) acts as a collaboration platform enabling interaction between users, developers, stakeholders. OULLabs brings together companies, public sector, educational institutes, service providers, - developers and users to innovate and develop products and services together.

Collaboration between service provider and customer can happen without OULLabs as well. In cases where user centric approach is needed OULLabs drives for the Living Lab approach to obtain user-driven innovations to empower ordinary people to experiment and co-create new innovations.

5.4 ACCESSIBILITY

Access to the real life test environments and labs together with real end user (test user community) for the 3rd parties is available via OULLabs. Funding opportunities, organizational capabilities, networking enablers, innovation policies and programs are available in case by case from service provider or enablers listed in table above.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 96 (143)



6 BRETAGNE COMMON ASSETS CASE STUDY

6.1 INTRODUCTION

This case study brings together several materials around common assets focusing on the ImaginLab infrastructure and services in Bretagne, France. Cities Lannion, Brest, Nantes and Rennes are covered. The contribution is concluded with several specific cases using of the assets.

6.2 OVERVIEW OF COMMON ASSETS

Asset type Services offered Images et Réseaux


Broadband communication, enabling high bandwidth applications

ImaginLab infrastructure encompasses: • A Very High Bandwidth Internet

network • An IMS Core Network (Alcatel-

Lucent solution) • A FTTH/FTTB real access network

with connected users • A LTE/4G access network (in Brest,

available in April) with 4 enodeb and an access to an Alcatel-Lucent EPC

Testbed facilities

Software /hardware platform for technology testing

Testbed includes all ImaginLab network facilities (full description in annex)

Imaginlab has offices in three cities:

Headquarter is in Lannion: • Network Operation Center • 2 showrooms of 16 m2 • 3 labs of 30 m2, with energy (220

v, AC) and air cooling • one meeting room of 95 m2 • provided with furniture (easy to

reconfigure): tables (16) and chairs (40)

• one video conferencing system

Commercial office in Rennes • 1 lab of 30 m2 • one meeting room of 30 m2 • one meeting room of 60 m2 • one video conferencing system

Technical Labs in Brest • 1 lab of 30 m2 • 1 lab of 20 m2 • Technical office

Testbed methods

Testing and validation process

Each project is responsible for its testing and validation process. Imaginlab provides the facilities for interoperability testing but not performance testing.

Living Lab facilities

User driven applications development

See our partnership with M@rsouin lab.

Living Lab methodology

User engagement, cyclic development, action research, data collection

See our partnership with M@rsouin lab. The methodology is derived from Images & Réseaux involvement in FP7 PanLab II project (UDI - User Driven

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 97 (143)



Innovation concept)

Human capital Expertise, know-how (Future Internet, applications, business)

ImaginLab provides the consulting to include UDI into R&D processs.

User community Availability of advanced users for experimentation and evaluation

The user panel includes in 2011 • 100 families in Lannion connected

with ImaginLab FTTH/FTTB Access Networks

• 100 people granted with LTE/4G connection in Brest (June 2011)

Collaboration platform

Enabling interaction between users, developers, stakeholders

Images & Réseaux is a cluster so it brings the developers. Images & Réseaux is operating ImaginLab which is both a testbed and a LivingLab, so it brings also the users.

Images & Réseaux and ImaginLab includes in their funders cities and regional organization. Nevertheless, the link between funders and stakeholders for e-services experimentation is not obvious.

Technologies, know-how

Application opportunities Pure technology items are described above in the assets.

Application opportunities are around TIC usage in following domains: e-services, e-health, energy efficiency, transport …..


Information, applications This is not under Images et Réseaux control. It is related to city policies: • Rennes Métropole is a leader in

France • Nantes Métropole would have like

to do it but not know how to deal with this (resource issue)

• Brest Métropole and Lannion Trégor Agglomeration have not determine their policy yet


Images & Réseaux is a cluster. In France, the basic activity of a cluster is selecting collaborative projects for regional and national call for projects (which are then partially financed by region and government). So Images & Réseaux is a network but also a mandatory gate to get public subsidies for collaborative R&D activities. The subsidy rate depends on the entity status.



Lack of collaboration framework between Future Internet and Living Labs on one side, and smart cities on the other side.

Other

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 98 (143)



6.3 DETAILED ASSETS DESCRIPTIONS

Images & Reseaux cluster

Images & Reseaux is a French TIC cluster, founded in 2005 in West part of France. French clusters are funded by government, regions (here Bretagne and Pays de la Loire) and members. It can be summarized as an R&D projects factory (currently 80 active projects) at regional, national and European levels. The taskforce involved in those projects can be compared to a virtual lab of 1000 engineers and researchers. Since 2005, the projects are equivalent to a 400 M€ investment (public and private).

Figure 1: Images & Réseaux facts and figures

The cluster works with many cities but the more implied are:

• Nantes (283 025 / 580 503 inhabitants, INSEE 2007, ranked #6 at national level) where first figure is the city inhabitants number and second is the urban area inhabitants number, http://www.nantesmetropole.fr/

• Rennes (207 902 / roughly 400 000 inhabitants, INSEE 2007, ranked #11 at national level), http://www.rennes-metropole.fr/

• Brest (142 722 / 208 955 inhabitants, INSEE 2007, ranked #22 at national level), http://www.brest.fr/

• Lannion ( 19773 / 55672 inhabitants, INSEE 2007), http://www.lannion-tregor.com/

Nantes city seems to be interested in the smart cities concept: Nantes Métropole attends to "Knowlegde society" forum inside EUROCITIES European network. The connection should have already been performed in Birmingham between "FIREBALL" project and some partner cities (Manchester, Helsinki, Barcelone, Amsterdam).

About FIREBALL project, Nantes is interested in:

(1) Future Internet research and experimentation (including test-beds and experimental facilities),

(2) User driven open innovation (such as in Living Labs),

(3) City innovation environments (representing the demand side).

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 99 (143)



One action of our side was to meet Hervé Jaigu, in charge of Innovation and International Development at Nantes Metropole (done beginning of January).

Rennes Métropole is also involved in EUROCITIES European network, in “economic development” and “knowledge society” forums. Connection is on-going through our usual contact at Rennes Métropole (Ludovic Lhomme) in order to get in touch with Mrs Catherine Dameron (European Affairs Officer). After first contacts, Rennes Métropole seems much less proactive than Nantes Métropole in EUROCITIES network.

Here are some main items about the cities and the linkage between the cities and Media & Networks

• Rennes, Brest and Lannion are belonging to the Bretagne Region, which is known as the land of Telecom In France (see Figure 2: R&D forces in Brittany and Pays de la Loire, 2009)

• As Nantes is in Pays de la Loire Region is more service oriented (banking, insurances, …)

• The Bretagne Region has co-financed imaginlab testbed with the French ministry as the Pays de la Loire did not. And that the reason which the testbed has offices and access network currently in Lannion and Brest, not in Nantes

• The Living Lab label (LEVIER) is applicable for all the territory covered by Media and Network cluster but it is operational in Lannion and Brest with imaginlab.

• The Media and Network cluster has its headquarter in Lannion and also premises in Rennes

Figure 2: ICT R&D task forces in Bretagne and Pays de la Loire regions

6.4 IMAGINLAB TESTBED DESCRIPTION

ImaginLab is a Very High Bandwidth Internet network with: • an IMS Core platform which is composed of following Network Elements

(NEs):

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 100 (143)



o Alcatel-Lucent 5060 ICS: Integrated IMS platform providing P/I/S-CSCF, BGCF, CTS(TAS) and CCF functions

o Alcatel-Lucent 8650 SDM – Compact Home Subscriber Server – Centralizes subscriber information (identities, service profiles, authentication…)

o Alcatel-Lucent VitalQIP for DNS and ENUM functions o Alcatel-Lucent 5900 MRF for announcements and conferencing usage o Comverse Session Border Controller (XBC): provides SBC functionality

(CBGF, IBCF, IBGF) and interworking function (IWF H323 to SIP). • IMS Application Services:

o Alcatel-Lucent 5410 Presence server to make available presence information to different systems and applications

o Alcatel-Lucent 5410 XDMS server to handle contact lists and profiles to be used by the Presence server and Instant messaging server

o Alcatel-Lucent 5430 MMIM – offer the service to exchange Multimedia Instant Messaging across networks, services and devices.

o Alcatel-Lucent 5400 SCE contents enablers to create new value added services

o Comverse Multimedia Conference bridge: provided by a specific TAS and a PCB (Personal Conference Bridge) AS for voice & video conferencing calls to End Users. This is part of the phase 2 project and is here only for indication.

o Nexcom Systems neXpresso-VoD coupled with a Darwin Streaming Server to provide VoD service to End Users

• Network management: o Alcatel-Lucent 1310 OMC-P for 5060 ICS management o Comverse OMG for exploitation and management of Comverse

products (XBC, TAS and PCB) o Devoteam Scrims SNMP Manager

• IP network: o Alcatel-Lucent 6850 Lan Switch o Cisco 2960 Lan Switch (Comverse NEs) o Alcatel-Lucent 7750 Edge Router

The IMS Core platform interfaces with:

• The FTTH/B broadband access network in Lannion

• The H323 visio conference equipments belonging to the “Images & Réseaux” in Lannion, Brest and Rennes.

• A LTE EPC and Radio Access Network

• The Acropolis IMS network in IP peering via the SBC. The connection to the PSTN/PLMN networks can only be done via this IP interface.

The IMS Core control plan and user plan are described in the diagrams below:

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 101 (143)



Figure 3: ImaginLab control plan

Figure 4: ImaginLab User Plan

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 102 (143)



6.5 IMAGINLAB LIVING LAB DESCRIPTION

To manage user panels, inside ImaginLab, Images & Réseaux is in partnership with M@RSOUIN (for Môle Amoricain de Recherche sur la SOciété de l’information et les Usages d’INternet, ie Armorican Mole for Research on the Information Society and Uses of the Internet). M@rsouin is a network of research centers in Brittany (4 universities / 2 Grandes Ecoles), supported by the Breton Council working with public and private partners on the uses of ICT. Research teams engaged in M@rsouin have two common denominators: the study of Internet usages and human and social sciences expertises. It is built on Breton Social Science Research Centre workforces and aims to develop cooperation with firstly regional, but also national and European public institutions and firms. More precisely, it is expected to:

• Conduct studies and surveys to help companies to better understand the emerging demands, design new offers and evaluate new IT services.

• Engage a prospective reflection on the Information Society, in order to assist the political institutions in the construction of public policies underlying the emergence of good practices and the access to these services for all the citizens.

The M@rsouin's main fields of research are:

• E-learning: how digital technologies change and contribute to new forms of learning

• Social interaction: creation of new sociability, new sharing process, new information and knowledge production.

• Public area: How can new digital technologies help public policy makers decide and citizen control.

• Market: Economic impact of ICT and definition of new business model.

The strengths of M@rsouin are the ability to coordinate, manage and integrate an important diversity of expertise, methodology and knowledge. Indeed the research team is composed of economist, sociologist, ergonomist, jurist and psychologist.

ImaginLab methodologies put users at the core process of research. Users are observed in real context or in specific situation experimented in laboratory.

M@rsouin integrates two main assets: • An observatory

• Couples questionnaire and research issues to produce original and meaningful analysis.

• Surveys about equipment and usages, prospective analysis, need assessment, satisfaction analysis, profiling.

• Building questionnaire, sampling, definition of quotas and representatively, monitoring the survey (recovering respondents)

• Database, statistical analysis (cross and frequency tab) specific treatment, multivariate analysis (typology, factorial analysis), econometrics.

• The laboratory experiment • Evaluating the uses of ICT

– User-centered Design Process – Collecting and analyzing data on uses – Enhancing methods of observation – Usability testing and recommendations for product improvement.

• Equipment : – Apartment – Audio-video recording – Eye-tracking and test room

• Protocol to test:

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 103 (143)



– Before design: user and organizational requirements analysis – During design: iterative design-evaluation – After design: acceptance evaluation, post experience interviews

Figure 5: ImaginLab UDI process

A full users panel description is available in Annex A: User panel analysis

6.6 SERVICES PROVIDED BY THE ASSETS

ImaginLab is technically and commercially operated by Images & Réseaux cluster. The services are accessible to any R&D collaborative project (at either regional, national or European level) or any industrial entity (private or public, large company or SME, member or not member of Images & Réseaux, national or international).

The service offer is derived from the assets, offering:

• Various Access Networks capacity

• Core Network features (IMS)

• User panel management

• Applications and contents

• Device renting

• Collaborative tools (meeting room, teleconference systems, show-room, labs …)

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 104 (143)



Figure 6: ImaginLab service offer

6.7 CURRENT UTILIZATION OF THE ASSETS

ImaginLab has been inaugurated in last November.

It is currently used by Mazadoo project (national project about the usage of social networks for elderly people in institution).

It has been used by FP7 Sardana project for a field trial demonstration.

It will be used also to perform a survey about the very high bandwidth introduction impact.

Other French national project will use in 2011 (Miriad project about ad insertion in mobility, ZeWall about near real-time video streaming in social networks, ….)

6.8 ROLE OF THE ASSETS IN THE SMART CITY INNOVATION ECOSYSTEM

Until now, ImaginLab has not been identified by Smart Cities as a key asset for their own innovation policies. The Brittany Region and behinds the Smart Cities have invested in a tool for R&D but this tool is not yet perceived as useful for their own “Smart” initiatives.

6.9 LINKAGE OF THE ASSETS TO OTHER ASSETS

• Images & Réseaux with ImaginLab is member of PanLab consortium.

• Images & Réseaux with ImaginLab is member of ENoLL network, under “LEVIER” name.

• Images & Réseaux has signed a Memory Of Understanding with DIMES.

• Images & Réseaux is partner of “Future NEM” project in order to establish link with other clusters and similar platforms.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 105 (143)



6.10 USE CASE WITH LANNION SMART CITY

With this first use case in Lannion, we try to tackle business model issues and public funding in France (and probably in other European countries): most Living Labs in France have at least partial public funding but the request from our public stakeholders is to be profitable after 3-year. In this context, Small Business companies are not ready to pay the market price for user panel involvement. We can mention a real case study where Images & Réseaux was asked to build experimentation on Smart Grid (really in line with Smart Cities). Images & Réseaux worked on user panel recruitment (with electric heating system or air cooling) and technical feasibility (connection with our IMS Core Network, data collection relying on SIP protocol like recommended by ETSI). The project was finally not submitted due to the lack of private financing about the experimentation (cost of 60 k€ for a R&D project).

This use case happened during a call for tender organized by Ademe, the French Environment and Energy Management Agency. Ademe is a public agency under the joint authority of the Ministry for Ecology, Sustainable Development, Transport and Housing, the Ministry for Higher Education and Research, and the Ministry for Economy, Finance and Industry. Its mission is to encourage, supervise, coordinate, facilitate and undertake operations with the aim of protecting the environment and managing energy.

Link on tender: click here

The tender was held in 2 steps:

• First step dedicated to R&D

• Second step to finance large scale experimentation

ImaginLab has been introduced in the first step of the tender by Actility (http://www.actility.com/), a Small Business entity based in Paris, Caen and Lannion, which is a member of Images & Réseaux cluster. According to their web site, “Actility offers core infrastructure components and software enabling mass scale, mission critical applications of the Internet of Things (M2M services enablement), with a specific focus on Smart Grid applications”.

Figure 7: Actility smart grid solution design

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 106 (143)



Actility asked ImaginLab for a quotation for a one-year experimentation (minimum duration must include one summer and one winter season for electric power consumption) in Lannion. In the solution design described at Figure 7: Actility smart grid solution design, ImaginLab would have provided the infrastructure with an IMS Core Network (Actility solution relies on ETSI standards based on SIP protocol) and an FTTx access network (up to the end-user).

The target for experimentation was:

• 50 homes or flats with electric heating system

• Small Businesses hosting building with electric air cooling (Anticipa Technology Park building was selected, as hosting several SMEs but also ImaginLab datacenter)

• One public institution (like nursing home for elderly people, Saint-Anne institution in the center of Lannion was selected as already connected to ImaginLab by FTTB, with a 100 kW consumption per year)

The application server was provided by Actility and cross-connected through VPN with ImaginLab Core and FTTx Access network. Core and access network configuration and management during one year were evaluated to 20 k€

The Actility solution relies on an external connected device (connected on electric meter on one end, on ISP box on the other end). ImaginLab planned to subcontract the installation of the device at home. The cost per installation was evaluated to roughly 100€ per site, so the total cost was approximately set to 10 k€

ImaginLab was in charge to provide and manage the user panel, including usability testing. Usability also had to be subcontracted to an external entity (a partner of ImaginLab specialized in open innovation and user driven innovation, with true references in that domain, applying strict methodology in line with standards ISO 13407:1999/ISO 9241-210, see http://www.iso.org/iso/fr/catalogue_detail.htm?csnumber=52075). With a methodology not yet selected by Actility (on-line questionnaire, focus group, benchmarking, interview, …), for a user panel of 50 users, the cost was evaluated to 30 k€.

So, the overall cost for experimentation was estimated to 60 k€.

In the project building, the various roles were:

• Actility was the leader, searching for partners and leading the project submission to Ademe

• Britanny region through “Bretagne Développement Innovation”, see http://www.bdi.fr/who-are-we) was involved more as stakeholder than true partner. Britanny Region look also for partners to join the project

• Images & Réseaux cluster with ImaginLab

The financing rules for ImaginLab written by ImaginLab funders (which are public funders i.e. French Ministry of Economy and Brittany Region) are:

• ImaginLab cannot be a partner of the project but a sub-contractor (ImaginLab cannot be directly subsidized for running the experimentation platform)

• ImaginLab sub-contracting effort MUST be divided between the private members of the consortium.

• ImaginLab sub-contracting cost MUST cover only the operational cost (which are only partially subsidized) and not the initial cost of the investment in the network infrastructure (which has been totally subsidized by public funding)

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 107 (143)



Finally, the project was dropped. Various reasons for this to happen:

• The lack of a big name (like EDF) in the French energy market inside the consortium

• The cost of the experimentation that has to be supported by a private entity and especially by a SME as there was no large company inside the consortium.

Lessons learned:

• Experimentation cost is a show-stopper for SME, even if the cost of the experimentation (the cost of such an R&D project is probably between 1 and 3 M€, with a subsidy ratio of 45% for SMEs and 25% for large companies)

• For smart grid domain, the consortium needs to include a big name of the energy market (only a leading SME in that case).

• Smart cities in Brittany (here Lannion but it could also be Rennes or Brest) were not implied as leader or stakeholder in the project building.

• The role of gathering the best talents in such a project building is not clearly established. The leading SME, Brittany region and Images & Réseaux cluster all tried to play this role but there was not a true leader like a Smart City.

6.11 USE CASE WITH BREST SMART CITY

Figure 8: 4G LTE launching in Brest

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 108 (143)



Having inaugurated a 4G LTE testbed in Brest, Images & Réseaux is working closely with Brest as a smart city. The process is ongoing to put in place the Living Lab: the 4G LTE access network is now operational, devices (4G LTE USB sticks) and USIM cards are available. The recruitment of the first 30 beta users will be performed in march, 2012. This job is done with Brest Métropole Océane (Brest Métropole Océane, known as BMO, conurbation authority in and around Brest).

Due to learning lessons of previous use cases, BMO is identified by Images & Réseaux as a key stakeholder in ICT projects that could be experimented on ImaginLab.

• BMO has a major business role, it is the first entity for employment in the area of Brest (more than 6 000 employees) with various fields of activities from networks (water, light, telecom, transport, ….) to sport, culture, education, environment ….

• Images & Réseaux identified various area that could bring some experimentation

• Images & Réseaux has scheduled meetings with BMO services manager in order to meet the possible stakeholders

• Images & Réseaux has scheduled meetings with academics (Telecom Bretagne, a famous engineering school in Telecommunication based in Brest, see http://www.telecom-bretagne.eu/about/, and UBO – Université de Bretagne Occidentale, see http://www.univ-brest.fr/ -)

Some application fields have already been identified with BMO

Transport: Brest will inaugurate a tramway mid-2012. Images & Réseaux thinks it is an opportunity to build a project both addressing technical issues and usage with new applications

Public safety and Health: a SME (http://www.camka.com), which is member of Images & Réseaux cluster, has developed a VAM system (Video Assisted Maintenance), which can host a 4G LTE modem. Emergency services could be equipped with such cameras (which are by default 3G compatible) for in-the-field exercises

Environment:

• Sensor network. It has still to be identified which type of sensor could be connected through ImaginLab.

• It could be air flow or air quality monitoring sensor as well as submarine cameras in Brest bay (in partnership with Ifremer)

• UBO academic competences on sensor networks model (see Figure 10: sensor network in Brest)

• Cognix Systems (SME) has already developed a prototype web portal for sensor network with Brest Métropole Océane (http://www.cognix-systems.com/reseaux-de-capteurs.php). By the way, Cognix Systems is also a member of Images & Réseaux cluster.

• Collaborative project about weather forecast with Brest Métropole Oceane (http://www.meteospot.com/)

• Link with Capnet project (http://www.eryma.com/fr/actualites/detail-dune-actualite/items/vestibulum.html) to be studied, project leaded by Eryma and awarded by Images & Réseaux cluster.

Culture: Serious gaming with UBO students with a student challenge to discover the city of Brest by newcomers.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 109 (143)



Figure 9: Proof of Concept for 4G LTE submarine camera

Figure 10: sensor network in Brest

Lessons learned until now:

Cities or conurbation authorities are really big organization with many services. Moreover, these entities which are in charge of providing services to citizen are not always aware of Living Lab projects and User Driven Innovation methodology.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 110 (143)



So, finding the key person is difficult for Living Lab organization. As a consequence, a good practice would be to rely on Smart Cities leadership. More than a leader, there is a need for a community manager in order to:

• Identify the needs of the Smart City

• Initiate R&D effort with academic community

• Identity and select the private actors (SMEs as well as Large Business companies) which would be willing to take part in the project

• Imply the Living Lab in the R&D process as soon as possible

Any competency with public funding mechanism is welcome in order to boost the project start.

Warning: the duration to initiate such projects can be long, at least in France

New opportunities after 17/01/2012 meeting with Brest

A city is organized with many departments, each one having its own projects. The meeting involved the IT department, which knows about the project but doesn’t lead them. So, those information has to be considered as a starting point for further investigation.

Sports department would like to develop an application derived from sportaneous (see: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lt2eTHibIU0).

A major topic to be addressed is opendata: there is an identified project manager for this topic, so a meeting should be held. There is no clear agenda in Brest, nevertheless, there is a true opportunity to be involved in Brest (identified as a living lab and a 4G LTE playground) as we missed this opportunity in Rennes (no network infrastructure, no active Living Lab there at that time).

The transportation issue seems not to be addressed with opendata initiative in Brest. The transport department is leading the tramway project, which should be launched mid-2012. The transport department is not in charge of the commercial part of the service. This has been subcontracted to Keolis, a private company specialized in public transportation services, which will in position to determine if it is worth to develop an application. So contacts have been provided in order to hold a meeting.

The communication department also has a project with 2D flash codes.

Images & Reseaux cluster has also financed a project named MIRIA which will an application with the Brest tourism center.

http://miriad.eu/etude-de-cas/redecouvrir-brest/

6.12 OPEN DATA OPPORTUNITIES & SMART CITIES

Opendata can be a leverage opportunity for smart cities.

Images & Réseaux is involved in various open data initiatives:

• city of Rennes: see following site (http://www.data.rennes-metropole.fr/). Open data are available since 2011.

• city of Nantes: see following site (http://data.nantes.fr/). The city of Nantes is just launching the 2nd of march a challenge for application development on

• city of Brest: see following site (http://www.a-brest.net/rubrique239.html). The process is just starting and I&R is closely collaborating with Brest thanks to its Living Lab.

As an ICT cluster, Images & Réseaux is also involved in “etalab”, the opendata initiative at French national level (see http://www.etalab.gouv.fr/). Etalab is also launching a challenge for application development (“dataconnexion”, see http://www.etalab.gouv.fr/article-le-concours-dataconnexion-comment-se-lancer-100348061.html).

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 111 (143)



Images & Réseaux met Arnaud Willaime from Brest Metropole Oceane, who is in charge of opendata policy for the city of Brest. Brest has already open some data, especially maps. But, on political side, there is no consensus on opening data and the target for opening data (open governance and citizenship or economic development). In Brest, it seems that economic development is the target (ImaginLab Living Lab and opendata are both under economic development department)

The city of Brest works with the OpenData: working with FING (www.fing.org, foundation for a new internet) and libertic (http://libertic.wordpress.com, an association in Nantes for open data).

Examples of open questions about data format and standards : • If Keolis (a public transport company, operating numerous cities in the west

of France, including Brest and Rennes) select a unique standard, this is an opportunity for companies that already developed applications for Keolis but it will more difficult for local new entrants.

• If the company is established in Brittany but in Rennes, not in Brest, is it local business development?

• Warning, in the public services sub-contracting agreements, there is currently no specific article specifying open data constraints (in order to force subcontractors to publish open data which may be public by nature)

• Warning, (real time updated) dynamic data are more interesting than static ones.

For the city of Brest, which is launching a tramway mid-2012, there is a commitment to provide data giving localization of buses and tramways.

The city of Brest will also publish its own data on car traffic.

There are also some opportunities in following fields:

• E-health: find the list of the doctors or pharmacies which are on-duty. Currently, in France, the information is available from the police station (you have to call them). So it seems to be some kind of public data, which has to be refreshed every week-end and can be localized.

• Sports & leisure: an application for Brest derived from Sportaneous (www.sportaneous.com, coming from urban zone of US east coast, providing information about spontaneous leisure and sport events). Such an application is some kind of specialized social network but it has to include public data about for example sports infrastructures (location, type, opening hours, availability)

• Tourism with list of Point of Interest, with a mix of public (Point of Interest fulfilled by Tourism Office) and private (restaurants, …) data

Arnaud Willaime also mentioned that big companies such as IBM with very attractive offer also target open data:

• Open data hosting for the city of Brest for 2000 € per year

• Development of a trial application in less than 2 hours, just for demo

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 112 (143)



Figure 10: Open data map (from libertic site)

Conclusion for open data: Open data provides many opportunity for smart cities (Rennes, Nantes and Brest, the three main cities of Images & Reseaux cluster have a true open data policy). However we mention some barriers or warnings:

• What is the target? Business Development or Open Citizenship? Balance between both?

• Data format standardization seems wise. This was recommended by opendata experimentations in Helsinki and Barcelona, in order to build European wide solutions. According to Jarmo Eskelinen (Helsinki) during Fireball/Eurocities workshop, the challenge was to create and harmonize an environment, with the ability to have the same apps in the main cities.

• The issue is that this compatibility make the market entry very difficult for a new local entrant.

• The interest and commercial pressure of big companies like IBM (but also some telecom operators) can be a show stopper for some cities which are more willing to develop local players and very cautious about public data usage by third parties.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 113 (143)



6.13 ANNEX A: USER PANEL ANALYSIS

The first phase to recruit « Imagineers » in Lannion has been closed in December 2010. The objective of connecting around a hundred households to very fast broadband, enabling them to experiment with the digital products and services of tomorrow has been reached easily (and even slightly exceeded).

Figure 7: distribution by household size

The current analysis has been performed as the households are currently in the process to be connected and supplied. It’s interesting for ImaginLab stakeholders to take a look at the characteristics of the people carrying out our experiments, before the first experiments begin. What are their uses, their relationships with new technologies, but also their expectations and aspirations as to their new role as “Imagineers”? This analysis is a translation of an article written by Sylvain Dejean (ImaginLab project leader for M@rsouin, [email protected]).

Economic context

Based in the Saint-Hugeon and Pouldiguy districts, the Imagineer households are home to an average of 3.5 people. The graph below shows the distribution by number of individuals in the household. 70% of Imagineer households have at least one child.

The socio-professional category of the Imagineers’ households follows the economic structure of the Lannion districts involved in the project.

This leads to an over-representation of higher intellectual professions, to the detriment of manual workers, pensioners and the unemployed. The current panel will be completed by connection to the projects of different organizations and institutions (Job centre, Post Office, high school, student residence) to address the experiments at all types of individual, regardless of their social class and economic situation.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 114 (143)



Figure 8: Imagineers' socio-professional categories

Equipment

The Imagineer households have quite a high level of equipment since 44% of them have more than 2 computers in the house. As each computer may be connected to very fast broadband (WiFi, PLC cable), this equipment enables several members of the household to be involved at the same time during an experiment and guarantees the availability of several IT media.

Figure 9: number of computers per household

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 115 (143)



Having one or more laptop computers is also an interesting resource for the people who will be calling on the Imagineers. In particular, it enables us to consider continuity of service at different places in the household, even a comparison of different uses inside and outside the home.

Note that laptop computers are only available in 41% of households that have a single computer, but as soon as the household has a second computer the possibility that there is at least one laptop computer is 93%. Note that 18% of households only have laptop computers and 8% don’t have any.

Figure 10: Share of laptops in the household

In addition to desktop and laptop computers, many of the Imagineers also have the most popular digital tools and technologies. In addition to extending use on tools other than computers, this equipment reveals an interest in or at least proximity to different uses related to digital technologies.

For example, 72.5% of Imagineers have a games console in their home (even if they don’t use it). The presence of MP3 and/or MP4 players and an external hard disk also seems to reveal the capacity that exists inside these homes to handle the different audio-video formats and probably to move content from one medium to another.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 116 (143)



Figure 11: Imagineers equipments

IT skills

The future experiments on the ImaginLab platform may require a certain command of IT tools, especially as additional equipment may be lent to the Imagineers. When the Imagineers are asked about their ability to maintain and keep a computer functioning correctly (update, cleaning, defragmentation, anti-virus), most of them said they were at ease (59%), others do it without feeling at ease (35%) or do not do it through lack of command (6%).

Figure 12: IT skills

Internet usage

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 117 (143)



The time spent by the Imagineers on the Internet is vital, whether at their workplace, at home or one the move; they shape their “digital” lifestyle according to their relationship with the new communication resources, their level of dependency and their ability to understand and use the new tools that will be offered to them. The graph below shows that 47% of Imagineers spend an average of one hour (or less than one hour) per day on the Internet at home. At the other end of the scale, 27% spend more than 14 hours per week on the Internet, which is an average of two hours per day.

Figure 13: time spent on Internet

As the graph below shows, there are various types of online usage, both in terms of nature and frequency. They show that the Imagineers have very broad knowledge of all the possibilities offered by the web, from keeping up to date with the news to sharing information, via e-commerce or audio-video content consumption. While some elements are used at least weekly (search engine, email, news), we can see wider diversity in frequency for more complex usage. In relation to keeping up with a social network or consuming audio-video content, more than a third do so regularly, but two thirds of Imagineers are still familiar with this usage.

Figure 14: Online usage

Motivations for Imagineers

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 118 (143)



Among the proposals that were suggested to the Imagineers as to why they committed to this project "participate in the development of new technologies" is the most common response. It strengthens the idea which led to the creation of the ImaginLab project, i.e. to make users real actors in the future of digital technologies, and not just consumers at the end of the chain.

The discovery and curiosity concepts were also highlighted, as was the idea of taking part in the development of their region. More surprisingly, only 27% of Imagineers admitted that they wanted to “monitor changes in their usage”; it is probably that the Imagineers for whom this concept still seems indeterminate will develop this requirement over the course of the coming experiments.

Figure 15: motivation for Imagineers

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 119 (143)



7 BARCELONA COMMON ASSETS CASE STUDY

7.1 OVERVIEW

The figure below summarizes the main assets of Barcelona Smart City Model. These initiatives are grouped under four main topics; Smart Governance, Smart Economy, Smart Living and Smart People. Other than tools such as kiosks and maps, Smart Governance involves a major initiative such as Open Data. However all mainly aim to provide a better access to government information. Smart Economy involves creation of innovation clusters, and a triple helix concept where companies, faculties and citizens can interact and collaborate. So that innovation can be fostered through these networks. The initiatives under Smart Living is mainly targeting new technology adoptions that are mainly initiated by municipal police and tool developments for public transport. Finally Smart People mainly involves training programs for digital literacy of the Barcelona City hall.

To support these initiatives Barcelona have built and/ or use existing or new infrastructures; the 22@ innovation district; Corporate Fiber Optical Network; WiFi mesh network; Sensors network and Public WiFi network.

7.2 COMMON ASSETS DESCRIPTIONS

In the next sections we elaborate a number of tables presenting the different components of common assets for smart cities in Barcelona.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 120 (143)



Municipal kiosks

Citizen’s attention: municipal kiosks

Municipal kiosks allow administrative procedures with the Citizen Council and to access information about the municipal services of the city.

Facilities The 8 most demanded procedures (city map, agenda, registry - direct printing of cense documents - , treasury – fine and tax payments – or library searches) can be performed directly in the kiosk. The devices are equipped with ID and eID reader, digital certificates reader, printer and credit card reader.

Methodology The foreseen 45 kiosks will be installed in several municipal facilities, such as libraries, malls, civic centres or citizens’ attention offices like the one appearing in the video. Its installation will end in early 2011.

Goal-oriented management

Internal eGovernment: goal-oriented management, strategic maps and indicators

The goal-oriented management project provides a comprehension of the overall functioning of the city at managers’ level and an improvement in the efficiency and efficacy of public workers.

Facilities The goal-oriented management project is one of the key internal projects of the Council aimed at visualizing the results at different levels of executive organization. It has meant a 180º change in the management of the city of Barcelona.

Methodology This allows a better responsibility dissection in the obtained results. This project directly implies the establishment of objectives for each management unit and monthly goals for several indicators that show the consecution degree.

Open Data

The Open Data project

The Open Data projects consists of making available of Barcelona City Council’s data in digital and standardized formats for everybody in order to foster their reuse.

Facilities The project is about opening of the Barcelona City Council data, for everybody, the information that the council possesses in digital formats, standardized and open following a clear structure that allows its understanding, facilitating, at the same time, the access to these informative resources in order to foster their reuse. They are resources of information that the society has the right to use, whether to brief themselves or for creating new services, increasing the social value and perhaps, also the commercial value. Five types of data will be offered: territory, population, management and procedure indicators, urban environment and documental datum.

Methodology The project will be implanted in two phases, during 2011 the service will start off with the creation of the Open Data portal that will be disposable with the first services the next month of February. Afterwards it will be consolidated and it will broaden. From 2012 the phase of enlargement and consolidation of the services will start with more informative resources and the progressive study of new resources to be opened.

More Information http://w3.bcn.es/

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 121 (143)



Barcelona 3D

The Barcelona 3D project

Barcelona 3D is an initiative to visualize the city of Barcelona in a three dimensional perspective, based on the 2D geographical information system (GIS) from the Council, lead jointly by Barcelona Media Innovation Center and the Barcelona City Council.

Facilities This new project was born from the necessity of evolving the current GIS systems betting for the introduction of a third dimension to the bi-dimensional cartography with a two-fold objective: to unify the territorial information structuring it spatially and to improve the understanding of the city through ultimate visual tools.

The Barcelona 3D model is of great value for companies devoted to urban planning or municipal services, since they will have at their disposal not only the visualization of a land plot but also all the information linked to that plot.

Methodology The city’s 120,000 buildings will be reproduced in 3D and 250 emblematic buildings will be specifically modelled such as Church of Santa Maria del Mar. It will allow to tour inside.

More Information http://www.barcelonamedia.org/noticies/161/en

22@ Innovation District

The 22@ innovation district

22@Barcelona project is the transformation of two hundred hectares of industrial land into an innovative district.

Facilities 22@Barcelona project transforms two hundred hectares of industrial land of the Poblenou district into an innovative district offering modern spaces for the strategic concentration of intensive knowledge-based activities. This initiative is also a project of urban refurbishment and a new model of city providing a response to the challenges posed by the knowledge-based society. When the 22@ Barcelona plan was approved, the infrastructure network in the Poblenou industrial area was clearly insufficient. For this reason, a new Special Infrastructure Plan was created in order to allow urban improvements on 37 kilometers of streets in the 22@Barcelona district with highly competitive utility infrastructures.

Methodology The new Infrastructure Plan calls for an investment of more than 180 million euros and allows for the implementation of a modern network of energy, telecommunications, district heating and pneumatic refuse and waste collection systems. The design of these new networks gives priority to energy efficiency and responsible management of natural resources. The Special Infrastructure Plan is run by the 22@Barcelona municipal company, which coordinates the different utility companies participating in the process.

These new set of infrastructures provide an sturdy platform on which utility companies can consider the creation of new advanced services and, thus, new business models, like the case of Districlima, the centralized heat/cold water generation system, which is explained on the video.

More Information http://www.22barcelona.com/

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 122 (143)



Corporate Fiber Optical Network

Corporate Fiber Optical Network

Corporate fibre optical network connects the main municipal buildings, using pre-existent means.

Facilities Late in the 80s, the Barcelona City Council decided to construct a corporate fibre optical network to connect the main municipal buildings, using pre-existent channelling such as subway tunnels or the sewer system. Up to 2010, the network connects 144 buildings and has a total length of 325 km offering connection speeds between 100Mbps and 1Gbps. It also proves to be a sturdy infrastructure to foster the municipal telecom projects deployment since it acts as the perfect backbone on which to deploy the actual wireless telecommunication projects.

Methodology Recently, the Council started the construction of a corporate dark fibre network aimed at fostering competitiveness and opening the market for advanced services. This new network is mainly concentrated in the 22@ innovation district and is now being extended to other business agglomeration areas such as Sagrera or Zona Franca.

WiFi Mesh Network

WiFi mesh network

The municipal WiFi mesh network provides wireless connection to those municipal services and employees working at street level.

Facilities The municipal WiFi mesh network adds capillarity to the municipal fibre optical network by providing wireless connection to those municipal services and employees working at street level.

Methodology It has 479 nodes that support 20 services, among others: police PDAs, parking meters, traffic light control or surveillance cameras. This WiFi mesh network is until now covering 30% of the city.


Sensors network

Sensors network

Sensors network aims to manage a multivendor multipurpose sensors network configured to be used by several providers.

Facilities Barcelona has also started to deploy a concept platform in order to better define the specifications for the city sensors networks and information and management systems. This network’s main aim is to manage a multivendor multipurpose sensors network configured to be used by several providers.

Methodology A pilot has already been done in the 22@ technological district testing critical areas such as: car parking, traffic flow, pollution, noise and lighting.


FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 123 (143)



Public WiFi network

Public WiFi network

Barcelona WiFi is a free of charge service that allows the Barcelona citizens to connect to the Internet through WiFi Access Points, or hotspots.

Facilities These WiFi Access Points, or hotspots are located in various municipal amenities, such as civic centres or parks. The Barcelona WiFi Service is provided with the aim of encouraging city access to the Internet and helping the public incorporate technology into their daily lives.

Methodology The Barcelona WiFi service already has 404 operational hotspots available. To access Barcelona WiFi from any of the service access points, all you require is an IT device (laptop computer, a PDA, mobile phone...) with a WiFi connection. The service lets its users carry out simple browsing on the Internet enabling access to content through a browser. It also allows public access to City Council information and online processing. It enables to browse the internet except for pages with content considered ethically dubious. So as not to alter the market, in accordance with current legislation, the connection speed is limited to 256 Kbps.

More Information http://www.bcn.cat/barcelonawifi/en/

22@ network

The 22@ innovation district: the 22@Network

The 22@ innovation district in Barcelona, is a real implementation of the Triple Helix concept: companies, innovation centres, faculties and citizens living there have the opportunity to interact among them.

Facilities The 22@Network association, currently made up of 101 companies, is dedicated to the success of district 22@Barcelona, the district of innovation.

Formed on the 29th of July 2004, the Association of 22@Barcelona Companies and Institutions is an initiative of civil society to actively participate in the process of developing and consolidating district 22@ as a dynamic area, that is both transformational and in the technological vanguard.

Methodology It facilitates the integration of companies and institutions that are set up here, as well as that of their employees, and explore the relations between them and the Poblenou neighbourhood with its rich social fabric.

More Information http://www.22network.net/

Barcelona Activa

Barcelona Activa

The 22@ innovation district in Barcelona, is a real implementation of the Triple Helix concept: companies, innovation centres, faculties and citizens living there have the opportunity to interact among them.

Facilities Barcelona Activa promotes quality and future oriented employment and businesses through several activity lines included in its Action Plan: entrepreneurship, businesses, human capital, employment, Cibernàrium and innovation promotion.

Created in 1986, this municipal company was born as a business incubator with 16 projects installed. Today, Barcelona Activa has become a local and international reference in the support for entrepreneurs, innovation,

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 124 (143)



professional improvement and creation of employment.

It involves facilities such as:

• 7@ Barcelona Activa

• The Entrepreneurship Centre

• Barcelona Nord Technology Park

• Porta22, New Jobs Space

• Can Jaumandreu

• Convent de Sant Agustí

• Ca n'Andalet

• Cibernàrium

Methodology Barcelona Activa offers responses to the more than 100,000 participants who annually come to its premises, coaching more than 1,000 new projects a year, with more than 115 companies installed in its Business Incubator and Technology Park, more than 30,000 participants have received attention in Porta 22, around 50,000 participants have entered the world of new technologies in the Cybernarium, while more than 1,000 unemployed have been contracted to learn a trade while working.

More Information http://www.barcelonactiva.cat/

Barcelona Nord

Barcelona Nord Technology Park

Barcelona Nord Technology Park is an innovation cluster in the north of the city, an urban technology park of 10,000m2 that has a large concentration of companies managed by Barcelona Activa.

Facilities Barcelona Nord Technology Park offers advanced services of support for innovation, consolidation and growth of businesses, and technological skills acquisition and diffusion:

Business Centre of technology-based companies: spaces prepared to accommodate small innovative companies. It is host to 46 technological companies.

Platform of business services: Logistics and business services of added value, available for the companies located in the Park as well as for other innovative companies of the city.

Methodology Barcelona Nord Technology Park aims to foster business growth, boost business co-operation, provide ICT training, access to funding to grow and innovate, IT skills acquisition and diffusion and contact with university and research centres.

More Information http://www.barcelonactiva.cat/

Urban Lab

Urban Lab

22@Urban Lab project set up in the 22@Barcelona district as a testing ground for innovative solutions for companies seeking to implement tests in any field: urban planning, education, mobility, etc.

Facilities

One of the aims of the 22@Barcelona municipal company is to consolidate the role of Barcelona as an innovative city. In this framework, a specific line of action is to foster the use of the city as an urban laboratory with the 22@Urban Lab project.

The aim of this project is to foster business innovation from 22@Barcelona, the innovation district; to enable

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 125 (143)



companies to trial innovative products in a real place so that if they prove their value they can subsequently be commercialised on a large scale in Barcelona or in other cities in the world; to learn and create new products or services that are capable of offering improvements to the citizens of Barcelona.

Since the start of the 22@Urban Lab project in 2008, more than 20 innovative initiatives have been run in the 22@Barcelona district in various fields.

Methodology

This project is to provide companies that are developing innovative projects and that are in the pre-commercialisation stage with the possibility of testing them in the district through pilot trials.

Some pilots include;

Implementation of 12 outdoor public street lighting points Eco Digital with LED technology in the 22@ district (6 on either side of the street). The lighting points will be fitted with presence, vibration, temperature, humidity, sound and pollution sensors, GSM aerials, Wifi Mesh access point and webcam for video surveillance functions.

Implementation of 2 charging points for electric cars and management and analysis of the system from a centralised control point in Barcelona City Council.

More Information http://www.22barcelona.com/content/view/698/897/lang,en/

Metropolitan Strategic Plan

Metropolitan Strategic Plan

The Strategic Metropolitan Plan of Barcelona (PEMB) is created to identify and promote support strategies for the economic and social development of the Metropolitan Area of Barcelona (MAB).

Facilities Promoted by the Barcelona Town Council, PEMB is a private non-profit association that brings together the 36 municipalities that make up the MAB.

The association's main tasks involve analysing and identifying potential in traditional and emerging activities, and anticipating problems and providing their solutions ahead of time.

Methodology The association's main tasks involve analysing and identifying potential in traditional and emerging activities, and anticipating problems and providing their solutions ahead of time.

The Strategic Metropolitan Plan of Barcelona is an instrument designed to: anticipate future challenges, provide the necessary changes to meet such challenges, promote the participation of all the agents involved, enable a consensus among differing interests and prioritise decisions.

Given the diversity of the institutions and administrations that make it up, the PEMB is a neutral body that serves as a forum for the comparison and contrast of information, the debate of criteria and the study of alternatives, until agreements are reached regarding the different policies to be promoted.

More Information http://www.pemb.cat/

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 126 (143)



Cibernarum

Cibernàrium

The Cibernàrium is a municipal training centre and program of digital literacy of the Barcelona City hall.

Facilities The Cibernàrium, whose main offices are placed in the MediaTic building at the heart of the 22@ innovation district, is one of the most popular municipal training centres in Barcelona. Its main offices offer more than 1200 m2 of innovative facilities. Other training points are also located in Barcelona Nord Technology Park and throughout the network of public libraries.

Cibernàrium is also the program of digital literacy of the Barcelona City Council. It offers training for professionals and enterprises, and it also offers learning initiatives for non-trained focused on all the citizenry. Thus, Cibernàrium us the meeting point of Barcelona for all those people interested in learning how to use technological tools, acquire the needed professional competences in knowledge society and keep abreast of the latest technological solutions or learn how to get started in the use of the Internet tools.

Methodology Its installations include:

• Capsules and workshops for technological diffusion, to begin to use the new technologies and IT tools.

• Advanced capsules for professional applications of the new technologies and of the tools for website design and multimedia.

• Off Line browsing room. A space to experience a first approach to the new technologies by means of a wide range of audiovisuals and related experiences.

• Online surfing room, a space for putting into practice the knowledge acquired and to surf freely by Internet at high speed.

More Information http://www.cibernarium.cat/

Citab Cornellà

Citilab Cornellà

Citilab Cornellà is a center for social and digital innovation in Cornellà de Llobregat, Barcelona.

Facilities Citilab Cornellà exploits and spreads the digital impact on creative thinking, design and innovation emerging from digital culture. Citilab is a mix between a training center, a research center and an incubator for business and social initiatives.

This project started with the idea that digital technologies, specifically Internet, are a way of innovation much more focused on citizens. Their methods of work are basically design thinking and user-centered creation. In Citilab, the Internet is considered a way to innovate more collaboratively integrating the citizen in the core process.

Methodology Citilab has been promoting activities as a center for civic innovation, spreading the Knowledge Society. Their methods of work are basically design thinking and user-centered creation. In Citilab, the Internet is considered a way to innovate more collaboratively integrating the citizen in the core process.

More Information http://www.citilab.eu/en

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 127 (143)



Intelligent transport solutions: augmented reality apps & Smartphone apps

TMB, metropolitan authority for the development of public transport provide services for citizens through the tools such as several mobile phone apps.

Facilities Barcelona has a mobility plan which goals can be summarized on achieving a safer, more efficient, equitable and sustainable mobility. To attain these goals is basic to promote the use of public transport and non-motorized modes (this is bicycles and walking). In order to keep updated with the latest technological trends and, thus, aimed at providing services for citizens through the tools that they use, several mobile phone apps are being developed.

Methodology TMB Virtual provides an augmented-reality application for iPhone and Android aimed at making access to the city's public transport easier. Via mobile a citizen can locate all of the closest bus stops, metro stations, trams and trains, and if turning in circle, which direction and at what distance they are located. If the mobile is held in the horizontal position, the arrows will lead you to the selected spot.

Ibicing provides information about the bicing service, which is the public bicycle system of Barcelona. This application has a menu that allows you to consult the availability of all stations from your current location (number bicycles available and the free parquing spots). You also can create a list of your favorite stations, and visualize them in a map with an interactive navigation, and with links to information of interest.

Transit is a new application that allows the user to consult the state of traffic in real time and see the live images of traffic cameras. There is a map in colors indicating the level of service of the main streets of the city (this is if they are congested or not), another map with the cameras location and a service of alerts that informs of all kind of incidents that may affect the traffic, as accidents or works on the street.

More Information http://www.tmb.cat/

Electric vehicle infrastructure

Barcelona, hub of innovation for the electric vehicle

Live (Logistics for Implementation of Electric Vehicles) is a public-private platform that was conceived with the aim of giving support to and promoting the development of electric mobility in the city and metropolitan area of Barcelona.

Facilities Electric mobility is a route for innovation and competitiveness on a global scale. Its implementation means that, in the medium and long term, we will all benefit: it contributes to reducing pollution emissions, improves air quality and reduces noise pollution, and it drives industrial development and transformation.

In addition, in an global context, where the search and the development of electric mobility solutions has become fundamental, cities emerge as potential test environments to extend these new technologies. The urban setting thus becomes a key environment for industrial activity whose nucleus and motivation for expansion is electric mobility.

The Metropolitan Area of Barcelona constitutes one of the

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 128 (143)



European centres in the automotive industry, holding 20% of the industry within the Spanish state. Supporting the development of electric mobility solutions is a key element for the global competitiveness of the automotive sector of Barcelona, as well as contributing to improving environmental sustainability and the quality of life in our city.

Methodology The Live project is a general and unified plan for strategic implementation of electric vehicles that is conveyed via 5 different lines to give support to industry, sustainable mobility and the environment:

• Giving support in the development and promotion of pilot projects in electric mobility (Living Labs), promoting the early distributions of electric vehicles and obtaining results and best practices from the pilots.

• Providing the necessary tools and resources to generate a network of innovative assets, in terms of both the economy and the industrial sector, and to promote R&D.

• Promoting the organisation and reception of events and activities that stimulate electric transport in Barcelona.

• Encouraging the deployment of public and private recharging networks throughout the whole metropolitan area of Barcelona.

• Becoming the leading reference point for people and companies in Barcelona, for any aspect related to electric mobility, via the creation of the first technical civic agency in Europe for the deployment of electric mobility.

More Information http://www.livebarcelona.cat/

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 129 (143)



8 THESSALONIKI COMMON ASSETS CASE STUDY The following section is adopted from the Thessaloniki Smart City case study, which is published in the Journal of Knowledge Economy Special Issue on Smart Cities and the Future Internet in Europe, published April 2012.

Toward Intelligent Thessaloniki: from an Agglomeration of Apps to Smart Districts

N. Komninos and P. Tsarchopoulos

http://www.springerlink.com/content/g350361m41tu362k/

The term "Digital Thessaloniki" is used to characterise the development of a series of digital spaces over the city. Main components of this new spatiality are various types of broadband communication networks, sensors and embedded systems, web-based applications, applications for mobile phones, and e-services running over those networks.

8.1 BROADBAND

Broadband access in Thessaloniki is provided by a number of operators, such as OTEnet, Vivodi Telecom, Tellas, Hellas On Line (HOL) and Forthnet, with ADSL being the main standard. Most Internet providers use OTE’s Bit Stream Network, which is the most extensive privately owned fibre optic network. ISPs lease ADSL connections to offer online services but they do not have access to OTE's network infrastructure. This is changing thanks to the liberalisation of telecommunications, as part of the aforementioned network passes into the control of the ISPs. The typical download/upload speeds available over OTE’s network are 2048/256, 4096/256, 8192/384 kbit/s and 24/1 Mbit/s. Internet access is available by first subscribing to OTE for a line and then through the preferred ISP. Broadband penetration is about 25% in the region of Central Macedonia and is assumed to be higher in the city of Thessaloniki with average bandwidth of 13.7 Mbps.

Additional connectivity is offered by the GRNET fibre optic network that interconnects the city’s universities, technical and research institutes to a wider academic and research institution’s network. Five points of presence (PoPs) are maintained within the context of the network: the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, the University of Macedonia, the Higher Educational Institute Thessaloniki, the Centre for Research & Technology, Hellas (CERTH) and the Informatics and Telematics Institute, which constitute secondary nodes that are equipped with switches or optical add-drop equipment, aggregating the customer's traffic. The GRNET network, managed by the state-owned limited company GRNET S.A., supports the electronic interconnection of academic and research institutions with each other and with other relevant academic networks through its upstream provider GÉANT (the pan-European communications infrastructure serving Europe’s research and education community). It provides wider coverage and much greater potential for the 500,000 students and researchers who use it. The GRNET backbone network of dark fibre-optic cable (Wavelength Division Multiplexing – WDM technology at extra high speeds of 1-2,5 Gbps) covers a total length of more than 8,000 km. All the nodes are based on routers with Gigabit speeds and are interconnected with a network of 2.5 Gbps speeds over DWDM technology with leased wavelengths from the incumbent (OTE).

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 130 (143)



3G coverage is very important. It is offered by three mobile telecommunications service providers in Thessaloniki: Cosmote, Vodafone, and Wind. Speeds for both Wind Hellas and Cosmote providers are up to 24 Mbit/s download (HSDPA) and 5.72 Mbit/s upload, while Vodafone offers broadband speeds up to 42.2 Mbit/s download (HSDPA). The good coverage of the entire city and strong marketing by the mobile telecom companies diffuse 3G Internet connections via smart phones and tablets at very high rate, increasing the total Internet penetration and accessibility.

Wireless broadband is offered by many public organisations covering various city districts. These networks have been developed by local authorities, the Aristotle University, the Expo, the Port area, and other public or semi-public organisations. The access points are operated at 2.4-2.48 GHz and are compliant with the 802.11b standard which has a maximum raw data rate of 11 Mbit/s and the 802.11g standard which extends the maximum raw data rate to 54 Mbit/s. A good example is the Wi-Fi network in the municipality of Thermi in the eastern part of metropolitan Thessaloniki. The Municipality has installed 13 Wi-Fi hotspots and the wireless network consists of Point-to-Multipoint and Point-to-Point links, thereby succeeding in covering wider areas which are characterised by either large numbers of visitors (commercial districts, archaeological sites, plazas, etc.) or areas which lack other broadband infrastructures (ADSL). The wireless network offers free internet access to citizens. It also supports the development of services and applications such as VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) and VoD (Video on Demand). The 13 Wi-Fi hotspots create small communication areas around localities of high accessibility, such as the Town Hall, the Mall, the Cultural Centre, the commercial street, Technical Services, as well as the Cultural and Community Centres of adjacent communities in Triadi, Nea Redestos, Neo Ryssio, and Tagarades.

Non-profit initiatives operating on a community / collaborative basis also offer free wireless broadband connections, such as the Salonica Wireless Network (http://www.salonicawireless.net/) and the Wireless Metropolitan Network of Thessaloniki (http://www.twmn.net/). With the use of cheap wireless technology they are removing the barriers that telecommunications companies erect to prevent the creation of a really cheap metropolitan network. They use antennas mounted on rooftops and windows and the free radio frequency of 2.4 GHz to create a free, locally owned, wireless backbone. The goal is to use open-source routing solutions to create an open and Wide Area Network with metropolitan coverage.

8.2 WEB APPLICATIONS AND E-SERVICES

Citizens, companies, and organisations located in Thessaloniki have developed a large number of applications and online services related to the city's activities, digital presence, and functioning; from individual websites to more complex applications for content aggregation, location-based services, provision of online administration services, and community services to citizens. Most of these applications are bottom-up initiatives created out of the interest and concern of their developers. However, seen as a whole they create a rich layer of digital services which is emerging from dispersed individual actions. The formation of this layer has characteristics similar to swarm intelligence and creativity, a "movement from low-level rules to high-level sophistication" (Gloor 2006; Johnson 2001). It is a layer composed of applications which were given birth to by the invisible hand of the digital market, and operated by developers, sellers, buyers, and end users without central planning or coordination. A survey conducted by the authors of this paper during January and February 2011, helped describe the major components and characteristics of this web-based Thessaloniki. The survey took place in three steps: definition of web applications which concern the city; identification and listing of e-services offered; and

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 131 (143)



interviews with selected e-service providers.

The first stage of the survey related to defining the applications and e-services which determine the web presence and e-services of Thessaloniki. Here we have a problem similar to the "building vs. city" issue: the city is composed of buildings, but "building" and "city" are different objects in terms of attributes and functions. Only relationships of proximity, agglomeration, collaboration, external economies, identity and governance, transform buildings and activities into cities and city districts. Thus, the web presence of a city is defined both by the sum (agglomeration) of web applications related to its buildings, monuments, infrastructures and activities, and by applications dealing with the city as a system of interconnected objects.

From this perspective, the following categories of web applications and web-based services can be considered as characterising Thessaloniki (and any city) as a whole, in contrast to applications related to its constituent objects:

1. City representation: Applications which concern the digital representation or guide of the city.

2. City sector: Applications which concern an entire sector of economic activity within the city (all hotels in the city, entertainment in the city, etc.).

3. City district: Applications which concern the functioning or management of a city district (university campus, Central Business District, technology district, etc.).

4. Citizens aggregation: Applications which rely on collaboration or collective intelligence of citizens (i.e. reporting of incidents, content aggregation).

5. City services: Applications for the provision of administration, social, community, safety, and environmental services to citizens by local authorities.

6. Location-based services: Applications for the provision of services relying on spatial proximity (i.e. location-based services, local offerings and promotions of products and services).

7. City infrastructure: Applications which concern the use, functioning, and management of city infrastructure and utilities (transport, power, water, broadband).

8. City management: Applications for managing and controlling the development of the city (i.e. city planning, consultation, decision making).

The second stage of the survey concerned the identification of web applications in Thessaloniki falling into the above eight categories. More than one hundred applications and online services were identified. A representative sample of them is given in Table 1 with the right column indicating the respective web address. Identification was based on expert opinion gathered from web developers, IT experts, website administrators, city managers, and utility managers. A search on the web and search engines also produced a good yield. Many different kinds of applications have been developed in all domains of the city, from virtual guides of Thessaloniki to e-services for business, education, culture, utilities, transport, and city management. Though their number is not as large as the number of all digital objects related to Thessaloniki (i.e. all the websites having an IP in the city), they represent a significant amount of web and smart phone based applications, which define the digital presence and online services emerging via multiple actions and initiatives taken by the city's population and organisations.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 132 (143)



Table 1: A sample of web-applications and e-services in the city of Thessaloniki

REPRESENTATION OF THE CITY

Thessaloniki Street View http://www.kapou.gr/

Thessaloniki 3600 - Virtual City Guide http://www.thessaloniki360.com/en/map/

City guide http://www.e-leoforos.gr

BUSINESS ACTIVITY

HELEXPO Thessaloniki http://www.helexpo.gr

Thessaloniki Port Authority http://www.thpa.gr/

Thessaloniki Industrial Estate - Land offerings

http://www.etvavipe.gr/(6019544444953489)/ecPage.asp?id=133&nt=18&lang=1

Thessaloniki Technology Park – Online technology transfer services for companies

http://www.thestep.gr/active.aspx?mode=en{54bbe145-5987-4897-843b-22fd99a3fb51}View

Association of ICT companies - Market intelligence

http://www.urenio.org/bi/

Restaurants in Thessaloniki http://www.tavernoxoros.gr/

Hotels in Thessaloniki http://www.booking.com/city/gr/thessaloniki

Groupon, Thessaloniki http://www.groupon.gr/deals/thessaloniki

Golden Deals, Thessaloniki http://www.goldendeals.gr/deals/thessaloniki/current

HIGHER EDUCATION

Aristotle University Research Committee

Online services

http://www.rc.auth.gr/

http://researchvalue.net/

Aristotle University of Thessaloniki

VPN and online services

http://web.itc.auth.gr/portal/content/view/18/191/

University of Macedonia

Information and Consultation

http://www.uom.gr/index.php?newlang=eng

Higher Educational Institute Thessaloniki

Online services

http://www.teithe.gr/modules/content/index.php?id=4

School of Engineering - Research Portal

http://rp.web.auth.gr/rp/index.html

CULTURE AND TOURISM

Regional Guide of Central Macedonia http://cultour.lab.rcm.gr/

Science Centre and Technology Museum "NOESIS"

http://www.noesis.edu.gr/index_en.php

Thessaloniki events http://www.saloniki.org/index_gr.htm

Thessaloniki blogs http://www.thessalonikiblogs.gr/

MOBILITY

OASTH - Route Planner http://www.oasth.gr/routes/routeDetaileng.php?line=61&ml=12

RCM - Ring road information system http://rrits.damt.gov.gr/

Mobility Service Centre of the Municipality of Kalamaria

http://www.kemdkalamarias.gr/Default.aspx

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 133 (143)



Macedonia Intercity Bus Station http://www.ktelmakedonia.gr/en/content/show/tid=135

Thessaloniki Airport - Ticket Reservations

http://www.thessalonikiairport.gr/tickets/

Bike sharing http://www.easybike.gr/

Radio Taxi White Tower http://www.radiotaxi.gr/

UTILITIES

Water supply organisation http://www.eyath.gr

Meteorological services http://www.meteo.gr/cf.asp?city_id=1

Recycling in Thessaloniki http://www.anakyklosi.gr

CITY GOVERNMENT

Syzeuxis: Telematic Services http://www.syzefxis.gov.gr/node/34

Municipality of Thessaloniki http://www.thessaloniki.gr

Thessaloniki Municipality Geoportal http://gis.thessaloniki.gr

Municipality of Thermi http://www.dimosthermis.gr/

Municipality Ampelokipon http://www.ampelokipoi.gr/

Municipality of Kalamaria - Business services

http://www.kalamaria.gr/index.php?option=com_content&task=category&sectionid=28&id=13&Itemid=244&lang=en

The e-services best known to citizens are those related to administration services offered by public authorities, mobility and transport services, and local e-commerce, commercial advertisement and marketing services. The most technologically-advanced ones and best integrated into the physical space of Thessaloniki are those relating to mobility (public transport, fleet management, route planner, intelligent road monitoring). Interviews with managers of these systems provided information about how they were developed and how they actually operate.

OASTH (www.oasth.gr) is the Organisation of Urban Transportation of Thessaloniki. It is a legal entity governed by private law representing approximately 2,000 small shareholders. The Organisation employs a staff of 2,400 who drive the Organisation's buses on a daily basis, providing services to the wider metropolitan area of Thessaloniki via 68 bus lines.

In the period 2005-2010 OASTH invested about 5 million Euro in satellite fleet management and online services connecting all the 600 buses and 3,500 bus stops in its network. The system includes many different digital services:

• GPS-based fleet management providing with real-time information about the position and working conditions of every bus. Every 20 seconds or 150 m the bus sends its position traced by GPS.

• Acoustic information inside the buses informing the public about the next stop, which is activated automatically by GPS data.

• Digital displays at the 220 most used bus stops, informing the public about the timing, direction, and arrival of buses. Displays are connected to fleet management and the information they provide is accurate and real-time.

• Route planner for selecting best routes in terms of distance covered or time spent with respect to the start and end points of a route. The user can find arrival times for routes at bus stops by selecting the route, the direction and the bus stop of interest.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 134 (143)



The development was subcontracted out to external vendors. Data entry and route updates take place internally within the Organisation. Data and applications are also maintained by the Control Centre on internal servers. The bus stops where displays were placed were selected by local authorities. Initially displays were supplied with power from photovoltaic panels, but these were vandalised or stolen. Bus stops also provide acoustic information for the blind.

The system offers information to 500,000 people who use the services of the Organisation daily. The added value to end users is in the form of better information on route (bus stops), inside the buses with acoustic updates about the next stop, and on the web or smart phone with the route planner application. Online fleet management is lowering maintenance costs for the fleet and ensuring a quicker response in the case of working failures or accidents.

The Eastern Ring Road Information System (http://rrits.damt.gov.gr/) is another application in the same field. It is an intelligent transportation system which promotes citizen mobility by providing real-time information about traffic conditions and advanced incident detection and management on the ring road of the city.

The ring road is one of the most important pieces of infrastructure in the city with more than 100,000 journeys along the road taking place each day. Currently the system covers a length of about 12.5 km in each direction along the Eastern Ring Road of Thessaloniki. The new e-service is offered free of charge by the Regional Authority of Central Macedonia. The system consists of three components:

1. The wireless network which combines IEEE 802.11 (Wi-Fi) and IEEE 802.16 (WiMAX) and connects the smart devices placed on the Ring Road (cameras, sensors, displays), transferring information about traffic conditions to the Control Centre.

2. The devices on the ring road, which consist of 5 variable message signs and a closed television circuit with 8 cameras which can be rotated and 9 fixed cameras. Cameras are equipped with image detection and processing hardware for recording and analysing traffic data.

3. The Traffic Control Centre where data are stored on servers and the software is installed. The Advanced Transportation Management System (ATMS) software from NETworks © is used.

Data from cameras pictures, message signs, incidents and traffic rates is also available via the internet (http://rrits.lab.rcm.gr/). The user should have a web browser or a smart phone in order to use the service. The data is refreshed every 2 minutes due to the bandwidth constraints of the wireless network. A Control Centre gathers information from cameras about traffic conditions and incidents. Traffic loads are displayed with different colours for low (green), mid (yellow), and high (red) traffic. The system suggests messages which appear on the adjustable message signboards, but the controller has to validate these suggestions before they actually appear on the Ring Road displays.

Funding for the design and development was given by the Information Society Operational Programme and the total budget was 1.4 million Euro. The infrastructure, wireless network and software were developed by a consortium of providers including ICT companies, transport consultants, developers, and the academic research labs of the Aristotle University and the Institute of Transport - CERTH.

Thessaloniki 360 (http://www.thessaloniki360.com/en/) provides a virtual guided tour of the city. It was created by Little Planet Image Services as a web guide to the city. The intention of the developers was to offer an advertising platform and create customised configurations to advertise city companies and organisations. Particularly important is the quality and aesthetic value of the

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 135 (143)



representations of the city, especially the night panoramic views. There are three applications on the platform: Address finder and driving directions, with a usual structure of point of origin and destination, drop down lists, and directions given by car or foot. Tourist information mapping, covering the entire city with geo-located information. Places of interest are given in 10 categories, from shopping to arts, going out, sightseeing, and life in the city. Virtual tour, with interactive 360° panoramas of the city. More than 350 parts of the city are presented digitally, including city views, shopping, going out, and the visitor can discover monuments and landmarks, explore the history, culture and city highlights.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 136 (143)



9 MANCHESTER COMMON ASSETS CASE STUDY The following section is adopted from the Manchester Smart City case study, which is published in the Journal of Knowledge Economy Special Issue on Smart Cities and the Future Internet in Europe, published April 2012.

Urban Regeneration, Digital Development Strategies and the Knowledge Economy: Manchester Case Study

Dave Carter

http://www.springerlink.com/content/1l8568n024328355/

9.1 INTRODUCTION

Manchester City Council set up the Manchester Digital Development Agency (MDDA) in 2004 to provide a new impetus to the coordination of its work around digital inclusion, digital industries and digital innovation. The MDDA’s projects continue to combine innovation through new initiatives, including the Manchester Living Lab, so that it can be the way by which people and businesses can easily connect and collaborate with MDDA projects and other initiatives, together with the further development of well established practice, especially in terms of digital inclusion, such as the “Selling on the Web” courses.

The starting points for this are:

• Access: ensuring that all local residents, plus those who come to Manchester to work, study or visit, have the most accessible and affordable ways to use the Internet open to them, including through local access centres, next generation access (NGA) networks and wireless connectivity;

• Business opportunities: enabling existing digital businesses to safeguard existing jobs and create new ones, developing pathways into employment through training and skills programmes, including apprenticeships, and generating new business opportunities by supporting new start-ups and social enterprises and promoting new trading opportunities and promotional activities, including through the Manchester Digital trade association and the annual ‘Big Chip’ awards;

• Capacity building: using digital technologies to build social capital and to support community engagement so that there is real local benefit generated by innovation which, in turn, increases digital inclusion, provides access to skills and jobs and improves the quality of life, including through ‘green digital’ and open data initiatives, working in collaboration with local partners such as the Manchester Digital Lab (MadLab).

Examples of MDDA project development in these areas include:

• ‘Fibre to the People’ – the Manchester Living Lab pilot project which is starting in the Corridor area (around Oxford Road, Ardwick and Hulme wards and Knott Mill) to roll out next generation access digital infrastructure using point to point, open access fibre networks and advanced wireless connectivity;

• Manchester ‘Internet Hub’ – ensuring that Manchester can develop its ‘Internet Exchange’ capacity to be a globally competitive ‘Internet Hub’ based on enhancing connectivity across the city, especially between Manchester Science Park, Sharp and Media City UK;

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 137 (143)



• Low Carbon Open Data Network – ‘Lodanet’: extending the wireless connectivity around the Corridor area to collect real-time environmental data using low-cost, low-power sensing equipment and providing open access to the data through a range of online services;

• Smart Innovation & People – ‘SMARTiP – “Smart Citizens in Smart Cities” – a European project connecting up digitally supported community engagement initiatives in Manchester and four other European cities working in partnership with Peoples Voice Media’s ‘community reporters’ project and the University of Manchester;

• Green Digital Charter – a European wide initiative to reduce the environmental impact of digital technologies and to develop innovative ‘smart energy’ projects, such as Internet based interactive smart meters, that can improve energy efficiency and get people involved in new and imaginative ways of reducing their personal and collective carbon footprints;

• Digital and Creative Skills – bringing together businesses in the digital and creative sectors, including through Manchester Digital, education and training providers, community networks and other major employers to develop more innovatory ways for people to gain skills that can help them get access to jobs, set up their own businesses and get access to advanced learning opportunities through non-traditional routes, including apprenticeships.

9.2 DIGITAL DEVELOPMENT IN MANCHESTER

A transformational digital infrastructure for the region will require three components:

• Access networks: serving businesses and citizens that will take us through the next 20 years and that will offer the maximum opportunity for local businesses to play a role in the supply chain. This effectively means “fibre to the premises” (FTTP) networks supported by the latest wireless technologies. These fibre networks need to be fully open: shared by competing providers and not dominated by any one company or technology;

• Digital hubs: where these networks connect with each other and with the rest of the internet, where digital businesses can host the new applications and services on servers connected to these networks, and sometimes where the businesses themselves can locate. These hubs will play a similar role to Internet Exchanges (of which Manchester has the only significant one outside London in the UK), but more of them will be needed, closer to the end users;

• Backbone networks: connecting these hubs to each other and with the internet exchange in Manchester. These networks also need to be fully open, available to technology companies and service providers to adapt with different technologies and to compete with each other. This is the primary role of the proposed NGA deployment in the Manchester city region.

By bringing low cost, open access connectivity to several important regional centres, starting with the Manchester city region, such a network can effectively spread the benefit of the South Manchester Internet Exchange (currently clustered around Manchester Science Park) to other parts of the region. This would dramatically improve the business case for the development of hubs and access networks in these areas – initially creating a city-region-wide digital development zone in Manchester and then systematically extending this to other NGA projects across the region.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 138 (143)



Truly transformational digital infrastructure requires the widest possible availability and accessibility of fully open access FTTP networks and the digital hubs to support them. Greater acknowledgement needs to be given to the active debate which is going on about the extent of market failure in urban areas as well as rural areas, especially that much more needs to be done beyond simply aggregating/stimulating demand. Active intervention is required on the basis of opening up the building, management and development of fully open access NGA networks using new and innovative business models, including the potential for social enterprises and dynamic forms of public-private-community partnerships. This should include re-use of public assets, as is being developed in Manchester in partnership with Metrolink (the tram network) and Transport for Greater Manchester (TfGM), and innovation through improved collaboration between higher and further education, the private sector and local authorities to develop the transformational digital infrastructure of the future.

The Manchester City Region currently has very little of this kind of capacity in terms of the global scale of development but plenty of potential. It has its small Internet Exchange, is developing the pilot NGA access network in the Corridor ‘Living Lab’ project (extending links into the Internet Exchange) and it has a new putative hub in The Sharp Project (to the north of the city centre). Competitor cities like Amsterdam are pushing fast to develop this type of infrastructure at a massive scale, through initiatives such as the rapid expansion of the Amsterdam Internet Exchange – “AMSIX”, now the largest in the world, and through gigabit trials on its ‘City Net’ fibre network. Given new opportunities, such as the expansion of the Metrolink tram network, however, Manchester now has a unique opportunity to gain ground and become a global competitor in this field.

Developing NGA infrastructure through the Metrolink-based tramside network by itself does not provide all three components of the infrastructure that are needed but it does bring two key benefits:

• It underpins their development by providing a kick start to one crucial component - the backbone infrastructure to connect hubs and access networks to each other and to the rest of the internet.

• It provides an immediate and affordable infrastructure that can be used by private and public sector to interconnect important centres. Contrary to popular belief, ‘dark fibre’ connectivity is scarce and hoarded by its owners to provide more lucrative leased active services.

This then would act as the catalyst for further investment and there are a number of ways in which the public sector could see further economic and social benefits from this approach:

• Public sector agencies joining a consortium that invests in and utilises the network could save very substantial costs on connectivity to the Internet and also some point-to-point routes. Improvements in connectivity will enable efficiencies in service delivery.

• This approach would bring high speed, high quality and affordable business connectivity to parts of the city region that would otherwise miss out. This would stimulate investment leading to increased employment with consequent direct and indirect returns for the public sector.

• By enabling the creation of new, affordable access networks in communities that would otherwise miss out, this could lead to creating new pathways to employment and skills supporting, in turn, increased social inclusion, better education and job prospects, reduced crime, and other indirect benefits.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 139 (143)



9.3 MANCHESTER ROADMAP

The Manchester City Region NGA initiatives are being developed in partnership by the Manchester Digital Development Agency, MDDA, which is part of Manchester City Council, and the Commission for the New Economy, working on behalf of the Association of Greater Manchester Authorities (AGMA) in the context of the City Region Pilot and the proposed ‘Combined Authority’. There are currently three linked initiatives being developed:

• The Corridor ‘Living Lab’ NGA pilot project, aiming to connect 500 businesses and 1,000 residential users through a FTTP network, being built by Geo on behalf of the Corridor Partnership, coordinated by Manchester City Council through the MDDA. This will be an access network test-bed enabling new business to business, business to consumer and community based applications and services to be developed as well as innovation in public service delivery in areas such as telecare/e-health, energy efficiency/smart energy, e-learning, smart mobility and flexible working. This is currently being built and the Living Lab test-bed will start trialling applications, including advanced wireless linked to fibre networks, from the end of 2011 for an initial period of 18 months;

• The Manchester “Virtual Internet Exchange” (M-VIX) proposal, which aims to connect the Corridor fibre network along Metrolink to Manchester two other key economic growth areas: Central Park, which includes the Sharp Project, and then to other key sites, initially in East Manchester;

• The Manchester City Region NGA Initiative, which is currently undertaking a feasibility study on the scope for market investment in new and innovative models of NGA delivery which would harness the advantages of the core network being developed in Manchester and extend this using all possible routes, e.g. Metrolink and other transport corridors together with Public Service Network development, across the whole of Greater Manchester, including those in the ‘final third’ rural communities and those in inner urban excluded from access by virtue of financial and other social barriers;

The challenge now is to identify how best to link these proposals in with national policy objectives and to seek support to accelerate their implementation. The Manchester City Region partners believe that this is an innovative approach which, while initially is very much related to the specific opportunities offered because of Manchester’s local experience and economic culture, can provide knowledge and experience which would be of benefit to all local areas and regions, urban and rural, in developing NGA across the UK.

This underpins the work that MDDA is doing to develop the scale and scope of the Manchester Living Lab through projects which deliver local benefit around the core themes of its work programme. Drawing upon its experience as a partner in the EU (FP7 funded) FIREBALL (Future Internet Research & Experimentation By Adopting Living Labs – www.fireball4smartcities.eu) project Manchester has developed its new Green Paper (referred to previously, with a ‘Roadmap’ for the Local Digital Agenda in Manchester. This aims to translate the overall ‘Roadmap’ for Smart Cities developed through the FIREBALL project into a specific document focused on the needs and strategic objectives of a specific city, in this case Manchester.

This covers not only existing projects being undertaken by City through the MDDA but also ‘bottom up’ grass roots initiatives being developed by local partners in collaboration with the MDDA. The ‘Roadmap’ aims to map existing work going on in the city region, which is relevant to the ‘Smart Cities’ agenda, and to identify how this fits into the future vision, the challenges and gaps which exist and the future solutions and innovation needs in terms of realising the targets and aspirations of the Manchester city region. The ‘Roadmap’ is seen as a first stage in the process of developing the Local Digital Agenda for Manchester

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 140 (143)



and the Green Paper is in place to stimulate discussion and consultations so that these responses can be used to validate proposals for future work and that this will be able to inform the production and implementation of the Local Digital Agenda for Manchester.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 141 (143)



10 CONCLUSIONS AND OUTLOOK TO FUTURE WORK

Characterisation of Common Assets

This deliverable has identified and characterized common assets for smart cities based on living labs and future internet experimentation resources. This repository is based on a number of cases that were contributed by FIREBALL partners: Nice Côte d’Azur (INRIA), Helsinki (City of Helsinki and Forum Virium), Oulu (CIE), several Bretagne cities (MN), Barcelona (ESADE), Thessaloniki (URENIO) and Manchester (MDDA).

Common resources for research and innovation include testbeds, Living Lab facilities and services, access to user communities, technologies and know-how, open data and more. Such common resources can be potentially shared in open innovation environments. The cases and projects discussed in this deliverable provide evidence of collaboration models for sharing resources such as the use of Living Lab facilities and methods in experimenting on Future Internet technologies and the use of Living Lab methodologies for implementing innovation policies of cities.

Methodology

We developed a methodological framework based on initial experiences in current projects where the integration of living labs concepts with Future Internet and Internet of Things experimentally driven research approaches are being explored. Here, we have worked together with FP7-ICT projects TEFIS, SmartSantander and Elliot and we also discussed several related issues in the context of FIRE and FIA activities. This has led to intensive exchanges with the FIRE and FIA community.

We foresee an increasing need to create easyly and context-specific access to common technical and non-technical resources and capabilities that can be shared for complex experimentation and innovation projects. To accomplish that goal to setup and operate such experimentation and innovation environments, issues such as technical access, access and sharing conditions, ownership and IPR should be resolved. The three project cases (TEFIS, ELLIOT, SmartSantander) show initial attempts to cope with these issues. We recommend that these cases are closely followed and evaluated.

Interaction with FIRE and FIA

The concepts presented in this report have been extensively discussed at various workshops, notably the FIA confereces in Gent (December 2010) and Budapest (May 2011) as well as the ICE conference (June 2011) and the Smart Cities workshop organised by FIREBALL jointly with Eurocities held in Brussels, January 2012.

Follow-up work

This work forms a basis for the definition of access mechanisms, an activity which is undertaken in task T1.3. In this sense, our D1.2 deliverable provides the basic information and concepts. However this should be taken up in next activities. One of the possibilities that we recommend is that or work is taken up by the new Coordination and Support Actions in Objective 1.6 (Call 8) which will start around Summer 2012. This will also enable a relation with Horizon 2020. The potential types and structures of collaboration frameworks and the concrete issues to be resolved in sharing research and innovation resources, such as governance, ownership, access, transferability and interoperability, need further examination and also need development and piloting in future pilot projects.

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 142 (143)



The current experimentation and innovation approaches used in some of the FIRE and Living Lab projects should be studied more closely in order to develop concrete examples of resource sharing opportunities. Initial examples of resource sharing appear in making user communities available for joint use with Future Internet facilities (e.g. the TEFIS project), and in making accessible Future Internet facilities for developing and validating IoT-based service concepts and applications through Living Labs approaches for smart cities (e.g. the SmartSantander and ELLIOT projects).

New directions, Horizon 2020

The Future Internet constitutes both a key technology domain and a complex societal phenomenon with an underlining huge expectation in terms of job creation and well-being. Effective user driven processes of innovation, shaping and application of Future Internet technologies in business and society are crucial for achieving socio-economic benefits. A key requirement is how, within an environment of open innovation in smart cities and governed by cooperation frameworks, the diverse set of resources or assets that constitutes the “engine” of ongoing research and innovation cycles can be made easily accessible for users and developers for co-creating innovative services.

The cases which we have elaborated mainly focus on making available these resources on a geographical area (urban environment, region). There is a need to explore the concept of connected cities in this respect, addressing issues such as how different cities in a region or in different regions can get access to the services provided by assets or resources hosted elsewhere. And, what kind of new services can be foreseen building on this concept of common, geographically distributed assets, e.g. testbed and living labs services for innovators in smart cities. There already exist examples of emerging bodies integrating a technology testbed and a Living lab, such as ImaginLab that is an open platform dedicated to experimentation, from integration and interoperability testing to usability evaluation for new products and services on fixed and mobile networks (FTTH and 4G LTE).

To some extent, projects dedicated to Future Internet experimentation and dedicated to Living Labs innovation may interact and even work together in hybrid models of which we have provided examples. Such models could be dynamically evolving over time, as “organisms” constituting the infrastructure of urban and regional innovation ecosystems.

Future Internet and Living Labs normally represent different cycles of innovation (see above) but there might be concrete interfaces and interactions. Concrete, practice-oriented projects should be elaborated in order to gain more insight and experience regarding the benefits and synergies, and regarding the integration of testbed and living lab methodologies.

Based on these thoughts, a future vision for 2020 very well might be that Internet infrastructures, services and applications will form the backbone of connected regional and urban, even transnational innovation ecosystems, fostering co-creative innovation and new business creation. This backbone connects the resources and enables the provision of and access to services independent of location (e.g. crowdservicing).

FIREBALL D1.2



Page: 143 (143)



REFERENCES • Schaffers, H., M. Pallot, A. Sällström, J. Hernandez-Muñoz, R. Santoro, B.

Trousse (2011): Integrating Living Labs with Future Internet and Internet of Things Experimental Platforms for Co-creating New Services within Smart-Cities. Paper submitted to the ICE 2011 Conference, June 2011, Aachen.

• Komninos, N., P. Tsarchopoulos (2012): Toward Intelligent Thessaloniki: from an Agglomeration of Apps to Smart Districts. Journal of the Knowledge Economy, April 2012: http://www.springerlink.com/content/g350361m41tu362k/

• Carter, D. (2012): Urban Regeneration, Digital Development Strategies and the Knowledge Economy: Manchester Case Study. of the Knowledge Economy, April 2012: http://www.springerlink.com/content/1l8568n024328355/

Documents

D1.2 Common Assets Identification and Character is at Ion