AMI@Work Newsletter No. 7 & 8
From AMI@Work Communities Wiki
[edit] Editor’s Corner
by Marc Pallot, Newsletter Editor
Another page is turned after the COMIST project is over by the end of March 2007 :( A new page has now to be written by both CORELABS and CLOCK projects with the support of all CWE projects and more specifically with the IP projects that are going to implement the Living Labs approach. As you have most probably seen already, a new community has been created with the name of “Living Labs Open Innovation Community”. Both SIGs LivingLabs@Work and Leadership@Work have been merged into this new community.
Many activities are going to be launched along 2007, just take a look at the latest news in the home page: The Expression of Interest for the second wave Living Labs is now open and next ENoLL event will be held in Guimaraes, Portugal from 21 to 23 May 2007; The EXTEND.ITT take up initiative has been launched and second CNO workshop will be held in Brussels on 12 April 2007. Furthermore, two more COMIST videos are now available: one about Clusters and Europe, and one specifically about Living Labs.
In this double issue, you will find several articles related to the European Network of Living Labs (ENoLL) and Living Labs Open Innovation Community. As you will see, we have created a new approach to collaboratively editing our newsletters within our wiki pages where everyone interested can contribute. We sincerely hope it will be useful for those who are going to take over the newsletter responsibility.
As already announced, the ECOSPACE project is taking over the support of our Collaborative Web Environment (shared workspace, blogging and wiki) and will progressively bring in new functionalities and new collaboration tools that you will be invited to experiment time-to-time. The main goal is to enhance our CWE, and to experiment and discover new collaboration concepts and scenarios where you will be invited to contribute according to your interests.
May I take this last opportunity for a special thanks, on the behalf of all of you, to my AMI (friends in French) colleagues Rudolf and Stanislav! Thanks also to all of you who took time to read this newsletter and have sent contributions, comments and even sometimes ....... encouragements! :)
We wish you all a successful continuation!
PS: Looking forward to welcoming all of you at ICE'2007 in Sophia antipolis (Nice) as I've the great honor of being again the conference chair like for the first edition in 1994 at the same location. It promises to be another interesting celebration of the ICE conference coming back to its roots...
[edit] COMIST is passing the relay race baton to the next team
by Roberto Santoro, COMIST Project Coordinator and Chair of the family of communities
After the launch of the AMI communities in June 2004, COMIST took the baton of the relay race from MOSAIC starting February 2005. On 1st April 2007, COMIST will pass it to the next runners. Yet there are two of them carrying the baton:
- CORELAB focussing on the European Network of Living Labs and supporting the Living Lab Open Innovation Community.
- ECOSPACE providing an even more advanced collaborative platform for all of the Communities.
Let’s take a look at what is happening. All Communities in the Family keep growing and we are now about 1800 members from all over Europe. The invitation to new participants from the NMAS countries to join our AMI communities has been welcome and now these new members are fully integrated in the community activities. The most notable milestone during 2006 has been the launching of the European Network of Living Labs. As you know the official launch took place under the auspices of the Finnish presidency of the European Union on 20th November 2006. COMIST is happy that 4 of the 20 LLABS are located in the NMAS countries. I believe the approach taken by COMIST to focus on the involvement of individuals as opposed to institutional organization to stir the integration of the NMAS countries into the ICT research innovation area has paid off. New initiatives are being prepared for the upcoming FP7 and CIP program and COMIST is happy to report that more than 100 letters of intent to participate to such initiatives have been already collected. The AMI Family of Communities is undergoing a metamorphosis to become if possible even more open. In particular we have transformed the existing Living Lab and Leadership SIGs into the Living Lab Open Innovation Community which already count more than 500 members. Our relay race is toward European Open Innovation and the good news is that many areas of the 7th Framework Program are potentially concerned especially those related to the great challenges of European citizens, such as Well being and Inclusion, aging Society, Rural, Media and Engineering and Manufacturing. It does not matter if you are a lyon or a gazelle… when the sun rise you better run…
[edit] European Network of Living Labs places people at the centre of product innovation
by Kari Mikkelä
The European Network of Living Labs was launched on the 20th of November 2006. The launch took place at the Dipoli Congress Centre in Espoo Finland in connection with a conference entitled "The European Network of Living Labs: A Step Towards a European Innovation System".
The European Network of Living Labs is an important step towards a new European innovation infrastructure. The Network includes, in its first phase, 20 Living Labs from 15 European countries. It also involves more than 100 active researchers and a representative group of innovative European companies. The Living Labs network concentrates on the development of new information society services, businesses, technologies and markets and places people at the very centre of product development and innovation.
The participants of the European Network of Living Labs in its initial phase are:
- Arc Labs Waterford, Waterford, Ireland
- Botnia Living Lab, Luleå, Sweden
- Open Innovation Centre Brussels, Brussels, Belgium
- Wirelessinfo Czech LL, Litovel, Czech Republic
- Freeband experience lab, Enschede, Netherlands
- Frascati Living Lab, Frascati, Italy
- Györ Automotive LL, Budapest, Hungary
- Gödöllö Rural LL, Budapest, Hungary
- Hasselt & Leuven IBBT i-City LL, Brussels, Belgium
- Helsinki Living Lab - Arabianranta, Helsinki, Finland
- Helsinki Living Lab - Forum Virium, Helsinki, Finland
- i2Cat Catalonia Digital Lab, Barcelona, Spain
- Manchester EastServe, Manchester, UK
- Madeira Living Lab, Madeira, Portugal
- Mobile City Bregenz, Vorarlberg, Austria
- Mobile City Bremen, Bremen, Germany
- Knowledge Workers LL, Munich, Germany
- Slovenia eLivingLab, Kranj, Slovenia
- LL ICT Usage Lab, Sophia-Antipolis, France
- Turku Archipelago LL, Pargas, Finland
The participants of the network are further described on the Internet at: http://www.openlivinglabs.eu
The aim of the European Network of Living Labs is to link the separate Living Labs innovations and innovators around Europe to a common European network. The network enables the development of innovation services, methods, testing environments and Europe-wide provision of those for local and international companies and public administration. This helps to achieve globally competitive European innovations and to create products and services facilitating the everyday life of people and businesses.
The network also provides an opportunity to test products and services produced in one country in different cultural environments and create easily-copied solutions from the very beginning.
The conference called “European Network of Living Labs: A Step towards a European Innovation System” has been held at the Dipoli Congress Centre in Espoo and was attended by over 300 research, technology and innovation-policy specialists from the EU countries, representing the public sector, research institutes and business world. A high-level delegation from China also participated in the conference.
The conference was organised by the Finnish Government Information Society Programme, the Center for Knowledge and Innovation Research (CKIR) of the Helsinki School of Economics, and the European Commission.
All Living Lab sites welcome new organisations for discussion about partnership extension. If you consider yourself mainly as end-user(individual citizen) you may consider joining the site-specific end-user community (see URLs in the above list of Living Labs). If you represent a private company, university, regional authority or other government organisation, you may contact the appropriate site contact person (see emails in the above list of Living Labs) for a discussion on how to join as a Living Lab partner with the objective to become sustainably engaged in its development and operations. If your Living Lab wants to become a member of the European network of Living Labs(ENoLL) there will be a call for "second wave" Living Labs in March 2007.
ENoLL Services
- Immediate Services: The “firstwave” Living Lab sites will already from the beginning offer site specific services as: Need-finding servicesm Public Innovation services, Test and validation services, Collaborative Mediation services and Innovation externalisation services.
- Emerging services: The emerging new services(to become available in the near future) include: Services to empower users, personalisation & customisation, Idea generation services and Professional Community services
- Future services: In the future, the more mature network will offer services like: Pervasive expertise sharing and Lead User sommunity services.
Contacts
- For EnoLL administrative coordination: Mikael Börjeson, Corelabs project, jmb@cdt.ltu.se
- For ENoLL support and development coordination: Kari Mikkelä, kari.mikkela@hse.fi
[edit] European Network of Living Labs (ENoLL) stand at the IST'06 event
CoreLabs — A European Network of Living Labs for Systemic Human-centred Research and Innovation - was presenting a Research and Technology Stand within the Novel solutions for business and industry zone (Stand: 6C).
Using modern ICT, the concept “Living Lab” represents a novel way to engage large user communities and stake-holders in the development of products, services and public infrastructures. “Living Lab” pioneers have already started to emerge in different European regions. Conducted by the project CoreLabs (Co-“creative Living Labs for collaborative working environments“), these initiatives will jointly form a sustainable “Network of European Living Labs” in an initiative also supported by a 40 MEUR portfolio of IST projects, which have adopted and are going to implement the Living Lab concept.
The objectives of this ENoLL stand were to:
• demonstrate a set of best-practices of the Living-Labs approach by concrete examples from existing Living-Lab´s pioneers. The examples provided visitors good exeprience on the Living-Labs´ approach, its benefits, organisation and working-principles, methods and tools.
• inform about different technical platforms, end-user communities and other resources available within the existing LivingLabs.
• invite different interest-groups (Industry, regions, academia etc) to joint and extend this European Network of LivingLabs initiative.
By a network we bring the extreme benefit of leveraging the concept of a Europe of Regions by its ability to simultaneously involve actors from various cultural, linguistic and regional backgrounds into the co-creation and evaluation process. This guarantees the applicability of products thus developed to not just one single but multiple regional market profile. Its intention is to make the innovation process more efficient and dynamic. These days, there is a growing need not only to show that the technology in itself works but also to clearly demonstrate the usefulness and market aspects of new technology. This adds new dimensions and complexity to R&D. The company and the citizens’ co-operation will bridge the research and the market which will lead to smoother technology development and faster take up of products.
The Living Labs provide a new environment for industry to test prototypes and ideas, an environment that allows citizens to influence the product development through close cooperation with the company. The innovation process will be carried out in a step by step manner. The company will get access to a platform based on different ICT technologies, broadband and a broad market made up by citizens as users, on local, regional, national or international level. As a first step in the innovation process the company will test their products or conceptual ideas on the citizens to find out the market and take up potential. As a second step the citizens will be able to influence the product development by providing feed back on the products through contributing with their own knowledge, opinions and user experience. As a third step, the company has the opportunity to react on the feed back and modify the product in order to make it as user friendly and adaptable to the market as possible.
[edit] IST 2006 Networking Session on Living Labs
More than 120 People joined the Living Lab workshop Nov 23 in Helsinki, Thank you all for your participation!
The workshop was chaired by Veli-Pekka Niitamo from Nokia and included an introduction by Mikael Börjeson and three presentations addressing the Living Lab Network concept and deployment from different perspectives.
European Network of Living Labs - ENoLL (www. Openlivinglabs.eu) - Mikael Börjeson, CDT (Sweden) Living lab (LL) services comes from the combination of three factors: (i) mmethodology, technology, infrastructure, (ii) pilot user organisations, (iii) organisation and Living Lab expertise. The added values of a LL network are size, critical mass, economy of ccale, market coverage, diversity, total competence, increased creativity fro mass customisation. EnoLL expected actions are improvement of individual LL services, LL network enabled services, joint open innovation community activities, coordinated national & regional policy making
Living Lab and open innovation approach - Marc van Lieshout, TNO (NL) A LL is a structured and constructed social setting that is created with a specific purpose in mind and in which the unpredictable, indeterminate and uncontrollable dynamics of daily life are the principle determinants of innovation. A LL research agenda includes: how to build on user social capital, mobilise a user base, create mutual trust relations, get access to ideas from the user, build appropriate business models, safeguard your own interest without frustrating open innovation, deal with multi-actor networks. TNO is involved in conceptualising of and participating in Living Lab settings since 2001, with specific competence in user centred innovation, business modelling, innovation in public services.
Living Lab in the eRegions - Joze Gricar University of Maribor (SI) The eRegion is the natural environment for innovation: an area of some 200-500 kilometers where business & government organizations & individuals extensively use eTechnologies. Universities can play a key role in LL development, with teaching, students’ projects, prototypes development, cross-border students’ projects, LL infrastructure, LL Network cooperation. The Maribor LL (http://eLivingLab.org) is focused on interorganizational eCommerce, in collaboration with ALADIN ALpe ADria Initiative University Network (www.ALADIN-Net.eu). The LL is working on eInvoicing in the eRegion, interoperability of organizations involved in a major disaster relief and think tank for eSilk & eAmber Roads Innovative Regions.
Pan European Laboratory for Next Generation Networks and services - Susanna Avessta, DIMES (FI) DIMES – Digital Media Service Innovations is a Finland catalyst aiming at creating an open innovation environment for the European ICT Cluster, where technology and competences are turned into customer driven services earlier and effectively, benefiting business and society. DIMES National Test Beds (NTB) collects Finnish Test Bed resources available for third party testing under one umbrella, develops independent test services and test panels, includes broadcast, telecom and ubicom networks for embedded applications. DIMES is the partner of Panlab (Pan-European Laboratory for the Next Generation Networks and Services), an FP6 SSA (June 2006 to May 2008), which lays a basis for a Pan-European laboratory for networks and services. http://www.panlab.net/.
Presentations
- European Network of Living Labs (pdf) - Mikael Börjeson, Coordinator Corelabs, CDT/Botnia Living Lab
- Dimes Panlab (pdf) - Sussanna Avessta Dimes ry
- eLivingLab in the eRegion (ppt) - Joze Gricar, University of Maribor
- Living lab-An instrument for Open Innovation (ppt) - Marc van Leishout TNO
[edit] European Network of Living Labs Workshop
by Mikael Börjeson, Annika Sällström, Hank Kune and Ingrid Mulder
This workshop was organised by the European Commission and the CoreLabs Coordination Action EU project in Brussels, Belgium, on 27-28 February 2007.
Goals of the workshop
The overall goals of the workshop days were:
- Ignite Network Service Creation
The first "wave" of twenty Living Lab sites have now joined and formed the European Network of Living Labs (ENoLL). This workshop facilitated the Living Lab sites to further develop their service concepts and started to joint activities for the creation of network-based Living Lab services. - Identify ENoLL Roadmap Elements
To enable the LL sites and targeted IPs to exchange knowledge and best practises. Initial steps for creation of ENoLL services, particularly in terms of Living Lab methodology have been defined. The most important ENoLL roadmap elements such as ENoLL strategy work, next ENoLL wave "call" have been discussed. - Redefine Coordination Principles
EnoLL establishment implies new challenges and opportunities when it comes to coordination. This workshop discussed and (re)defined also LL-site/IP coordination principles as well as coordination projects CORELABS/CLOCK facilitation roles and key activities.
This workshop gathered 60 representatives from the European Commission directorate Information Society and Media, first wave members of the European Network of Living Labs, the IP-portfolio of CWE projects, and representatives for the upcoming EU presidency of Portugal and Slovenia. The overall aims of the workshop were to begin the empowerment process of the network (ENoLL), to roadmap the future of the network and to define the supporting role of the Coordination Actions CoreLabs and CLOCK.
Some questions adressed during the workshop-days were:
- What is the most valuable asset of your Living Lab?
- What were the most difficult issues you were faced with regarding organisational, technical and contextual aspects?
- What is your most important lesson learned that you want to share with colleagues in ENoLL?
- What is your main advice for the future of ENoLL? How do you see your position in ENoLL?
- What can your project 'bring to the party' for the benefit of all?
In addition, issues of ENOLL value-adding service creation, methodologies, and network governance were dealt with in the various participative sessions. In separate discussions participants explored possibilities for collaboration in future European Commission projects, identifying several promising areas for new projects. The interactive format of the sessions gave participants the opportunity to meet each other, explore common interests and synergies, and contribute freely to the discussions.
First observations made by the CoreLabs project indicate that people are keen to exchange methods and tools and share best practices. We vividly discussed what the Living Labs want to share with others and what the ENoLL might offer the Living Labs. There were explicit requests for getting advice and each other’s experiences in setting up a new Living Lab. This exchange of best practices and lessons learned are a valuable resource ENoLL could offer to new parties, and could also serve to broaden the ENOLL itself; as a loosely coupled network that shares a common interest in involving users in open innovation processes.
The next step for the European Network of Living Labs is the process by which the network will be extended to include a second wave of Living Labs. The call for an Expression of Interest will be launched in Hasselt, Belgium on March 27, followed by a call for applications in Guimares, Portugal in May 21st – 23rd.
An important part of activities surrounding the European Network of Living Labs is the Living Labs Open Innovation Community. At the launch of this new community on 20th November 2006, earlier existing LivingLabs@Work and Leadership@Work Special Interest Groups (from 2004) were merged into the new community with all individuals interested in Living Labs.
This community has the potential to leverage the learning experience of dozens of living labs and hundreds of individuals to create value for users throughout Europe. So far, more than 400 persons have registered as members and we welcome more members. To become a member please register at: Living Labs Open Innovation Community
[edit] Why Clusters matter for Europe
by Paul Ormerod
COMIST has produced a short film about Clusters, a topic of particular interest to those who are juggling the challenge of industrial development and the growth of innovation centres in Central and Eastern Europe. Walter Herriot, the Director of the Cambridge St John’s Innovation Centre, the largest business incubator in the UK, shares his thoughts on why Clusters matter for the development of competitive innovation in Europe. He starts by defining what a cluster is, and then compares the nature of varying clustering activities across Europe and in the US. He makes the amusing comparison between Cambridge and Silicon Valley. “They both fly, they have wings, but it’s like comparing a seagull with a Boeing 747”.
Walter encourages us to recognise the variety of cluster models that have been established across Europe, what have they been designed to do, and to identify which model would work best for our own region and industrial concentration.
This short 3 minute film is a useful stimulus to conversation on this important topic and is freely available for viewing on the COMIST AMI communities Wiki web page. A copy can be obtained from Paul Ormerod at eUconnect Ltd, the producer of the film, by emailing pfo@harston.demon.co.uk.
[edit] Users take the reins of Innovation
by Paul Ormerod
The COMIST Project has produced a short 14 minute film about Living Labs, which explains how they could revolutionise the world of innovation, enhancing Europe’s global competitiveness. Matti Vanhanen, the Prime Minister of Finland, opens the film with his thoughts on the importance of the Living Labs concept, putting it very succinctly “The European Network of Living Labs is the first step to a new European Innovation System. The EU is for a human centric, all inclusive knowledge society of services and technologies”. The film then gives a platform to a range of key figures who are helping to establish the Living Labs network. Richard Straub, the chair of the AMI@Work Policy Group adds, “ What’s happening is that innovation is moving from something controlled by the manufacturer to something where the user takes a more active role – even becoming the innovator himself”.
In the Living Labs film we are then taken on a journey exploring two of the Living Labs that are up and working today, to see what we really mean by bottom up innovation. The first is the Helsinki Virtual Village, where we are able to understand a range of initiatives from engineered and enhanced social communication in community of people sharing a block of flats to students building and experimenting with a virtual world of innovation in Second Life. We are then whisked across the Baltic to Northern Sweden, where at Lulea University of Technology a Living Labs has been set up, which manages a network of 6,000 people who they refer to as “test Pilots”. These willing subjects, who are in the driving seat of innovation, are:
- helping retailers understand consumer relationship management
- enabling nomadic people near the Artic Circle to be in closer communication
- capturing driver behaviour in hazardous road conditions
- making sure that a cultural centre’s design really reflects community wishes
All of these 6,000 subjects, consumers and business people, give freely of their time, in the knowledge that functional specification of services being developed will be refined to give them the experience they truly want as consumers. Living Labs are springing up across Europe, as the concept of bottom up innovation is appreciated for what it is by developers of technologies and services; a truly more efficient process for giving the user what they truly want and a mechanism for leveraging Europe’s competitiveness in a world where innovation is a sustainable form of competitive advantage.
A copy can be obtained from Paul Ormerod at eUconnect Ltd, the producer of the film, by emailing pfo@harston.demon.co.uk.
[edit] ENoLL and Living Labs Open Innovation Community Workshop in Hasselt
By Tunde Kallai
The IBBT-iCity Living Lab, member of the ENoLL first wave, hosted in Hasselt, Belgium, on 27 March 2007, an event of the Living Labs Open Innovation Community and the European Network of Living Labs (ENoLL). This workshop was co-organised by the CoreLabs, CLOCK and COMIST. The Living Labs Open Innovation Community meeting in Hasselt was a unique occasion to bring together those interested in Living Labs and open innovation. The representatives of IBBT –iCity Living Lab met other Living-Labs leaders from Spain, Sweden, Hungary, Finland, and The Netherlands.
The community members explored the initial results through some thematic use cases such as eServices, Rural, Logistics, Social innovation, and eHealth, of their own practising Living Labs. They also discussed the latest Living Labs developments in diverse perspectives: policy-based, industry-driven, national networks, test-beds, explored the initial results for co-creative Living Labs.
Key policy messages have been expressed by Per Blixt, Head of Unit, New Infrastructure Paradigms & Experimental Facilities and Bror Salmelin, Adviser, ICT addressing Societal Challenges, both from EC- DG INFSO & Media.
The Networks of Living Labs includes:
- Currently running test and experimentation environments, which are strongly related to the Living Labs vision or already qualify as Living Lab.
- New Living Labs, as co-funded by the European Commission, regional and national agencies or commercial operations.
- Potential Living Labs that could evolve soon from ongoing policy initiatives in EU member states.
When we are talking about the European and National Funds in the next 7 years period, out of FP7 and CIP, within the Rural Policy program, between 2007 and 2013, currently about €7 billion is planned to be invested on ICT, with approximately half of this amount allocated to infrastructure and the rest to services for citizens and enterprises. ICT generate positive side effects in the economy through learning-by-doing, faster transfer of know-how and increased transparency. These aspects are at the heart of the synergy between the action plan of the i2010 policy initiative – A European Information Society for Growth and Jobs – and the new regional policy for 2007-2013, that will support these goals, as communicated in the Cohesion Policy by DG Regio in their recent document: http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/activities/policy_link/documents/regions.pdf
Innovation and competitiveness are the cornerstones of this new approach. By giving ownership to regional and local actors, it promotes the capacity building for innovation. Cohesion policy is thus a key driver in the implementation of the Lisbon strategy.” More info: http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/activities/policy_link/index_en.htm .
What are the Key Challenges for the Open Innovation Community for the individuals, the communities and the regions?
- Overcome failures in collaborative innovation.
- Establish effective forms of user-centric innovation.
- Establish regionally connected networks of innovation.
- Create mechanisms to generate networking effects.
- Establish effective operational instruments.
- Engage in awareness creation.
- Rapid pro-active expansion.
- Establish policies strengthening the potential of Living Labs.
Mikael Börjeson, Coordinator, CoreLabs Coordination Action, CEO, Centre for Distance-spanning Technologies, Luleå University of Technology, Sweden and Dr Álvaro Oliveira, Chair and policy coordinator of CLOCK, Managing Director, Alfamicro Lda, Portugal, summarized the main messages of the workshop. The event highlighted the launch of the Call for Expressions of Interest for the ENoLL second wave. Following the event, any interested Living Lab will be able to fill in an open web-based Expression of Interest, responding to key questions prepared by CoreLabs, CLOCK and COMIST on ENoLL Expression of Interest for the second wave of Living Labs
Please adress your organisations answers (max. 400 words) to the following questions:
- Why does your Living Lab want to join the network?
- What can you contribute to the network?
- Describe a case(proof-of-concept); one of your success stories
- What are your plans for making your Living Lab sustainable?
For the expression of interest to be taken into account in planning and future development of the Network, kindly enter it latest April 30 2007.
[edit] Coming-up Events
European Network of Living Labs Event
and related meetings, to be held in Guimarães, Portugal, from 21 to 23 May 2007
details to be announced at: www.openlivinglabs.eu and www.ami-communities.eu
ICE’2007 Conference
and related meetings, to be held in Sophia Antipolis (Nice), France, from 4 to 6 June 2007
“Concurrent Innovation: an emerging paradigm for Collaboration & Competitiveness in the extended enterprise”
Event website and registration link: www.ice-conference.org
Instructions for submission
Please submit an extended abstract with 1200 – 1500 words (not less, not more). Describe clearly the purpose and relevance of the paper, references to existing theories and related works, research methods used and major results.
Important Dates
Online papers submission opens: 15 November 2006
Deadline to submit extended abstracts: 31 January 2007
Notification of acceptance: 1 March 2007
Submission of final papers: 15 April 2007
Published by:
AMI@Work Newsletter is published by: COMIST Consortium
Editorial Coordinator: Marc Pallot, ESoCE-NET
Editorial Board: Tünde Kallai, Marc Pallot, Roberto Santoro
AMI@Work Newsletter is supported by: European Commission FP6-2004-IST3-015809-SSA, COMIST
