Tech Project
Description of the challenges faced by the Tech Project
Existing platforms can connect people, but they cannot make them collaborate effectively (‘you can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink’). There are a number of reasons why SMEs do not end up collaborating effectively through online platforms: 1. Lack of open innovation mindset. 2. Lack of trust. There are still concerns among many SMEs about the security of data held in the cloud. The lack of face-to-face interaction reduces the opportunities for building such trust 3. Lack of support. SMEs feel isolated and unsupported, which further reduces their willingness to collaborate openly. 4. Lack of process. Platforms are often very good at establishing connections, but not at providing ongoing support, tools and processes to enable open innovation to progress smoothly 5. Resistance to change. 6. Massive and unstructured information. SMEs are immersed in an environment full of data, reports, news, competitors, stakeholders, online platforms, etc.
Brief description of technology
The project offers a pioneering solution to boost the networking and innovation support to the SMEs. The main improvements proposed by the consortium to the current existing services can be described as follow: • Direct and ongoing support provided by the innovation advisors involved in each NIR that will collaborate with the SMEs to achieve the goals of the innovation partnership. • Links to other innovation platforms that will allow the participation in the same NIR. • Efficiency reducing the use of phone calls and emails in order to boost added value services on the innovation loop. • Self-design of new services by the innovation advisor using the ‘workflow builder wizard’. • NIR room is a secure integrated module for facilitating the dialogue among the companies and innovation advisors with many suitable tools like videochat or other added value functionalities. • Monitoring the process and collection of documents for reporting and data for analytics. • Delivery of documentation/information to all the Rooms working in specific topics (IPR, legislation, technical guides, etc) • Added value information will be provided automatically about partnering and market/technology watch: referrals, expert/partner finding and info from the market and the scientific state of the art. • NIR will provide the user with some advanced matching services.
What the project is looking to gain from the collaboration and what kind of artist would be suitable
The main outcome envisioned with a potential collaboration with people coming from humanities artists are the vision and strategy on how to turn human communication through machines (in this case communication through an online platform) in something more human and more familiar, that can generate a high level of comfort and trust for people using it. Any kind of artist working on communication, human expression, body language, etc might be suitable to contribute with innovative ideas to this challenge.
Resources available to the artist
Our offices follow an open space scheme where researchers, engineers and consultants share space and work. We can provide for people coming to collaborate a desk space with a computer and Internet connection. Furthermore, we are part of the University of Girona so we can provide access to the universitie’s spaces and labs.