Tobias Heger

The EIT ICT Labs - Towards a Leading European Innovation Initiative

Abstract In this introductory article to the EIT ICT Labs we outline its innovation ecosystem and recap the underlying motives for its foundation from the perspectives of industry, academia and society. The EIT ICT Labs are one of the initial Knowledge and Innovation Communities (KICs) of the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT) that was founded in 2008. It bundles and facilitates the competences and resources of its 65 high profile partners from academia and industry to tackle the grand societal challenges such as ever increasing importance of ICT for various industries, the digitalizing energy environment and advanced mobility systems and the increasingly urbanized society. Zusammenfassung In diesem Einführungsartikel zu den EIT ICT Labs rekapitulieren wir die zugrundliegenden Motive, die zu ihrer Gründung geführt haben und erläutern das entstandene Ökosystem. Die EIT ICT Labs sind eines der ersten Knowledge and Innovation Communities (KIC) des Europäischen Instituts für Innovation und Technologie (EIT), das 2008 von der Europäischen Kommission ins Leben gerufen wurde. Sie bündeln und fördern die Fähigkeiten und Kompetenzen der 65 Partnerorganisationen aus Industrie und Wissenschaft, um insbesondere die mit Informations- und Kommunikationstechnologien in Verbindung stehenden Herausforderungen der heutigen Gesellschaft zu meistern. Diese beinhalten unter anderem die steigende Wichtigkeit von IKT für eine Vielzahl an Industrien, das sich stark verändernde Umfeld im Energiesektor, fortgeschrittene Mobilitätssysteme und die zunehmend städtische Gesellschaft.

Economical analysis of experience-optimized service delivery

This paper evaluates the potential market for experience-optimized service delivery also known as Quality of Experience (QoE). The competitive environment, market potential as well as revenue and cost estimations are part of the analysis that has been conducted within the EUREKA CELTIC project RUBENS. Major findings imply an implicit demand for QoE that remains to be explicated and initiated. A major driver for QoE technologies is the need for network operators to be able to deliver new, personalized and video related services with the quality levels that customers expect. This driver goes along with expected network congestion in the future and the wish for network efficiency increases. This results in the need for access and aggregation networks to become more cost efficient, whereas increasing expenditures for control and application servers would be coherent to customer expectations.

Value Creation from Networked Foresighting in the EIT ICT Labs

Results from an in-depth study of networked foresighting are presented, and the added value for the nodes in the network forming the organization under study analyzed. The network’s nodes use the results to a very high degree for data collection and activity initiation. Benefits include new insights and outside opinions from a trusted network. Foresighting results are used less for sensitive aspects such as guidance for strategy, decision-making and fundamental organizational issues such as path-dependency. Here, the results were found to be too general and not applicable to needs. The network itself benefits from foresight in most known ways, i.e. for triggering responses, starting and facilitating strategic discussions and change, identifying needed resources, and several secondary uses. New aspects valid for the network itself but less for its nodes were identified.

A multi-actor analysis of the QoE environment

The concept of Quality of Experience (QoE) comprises quality as perceived by the end user. The implementation of technologies that allow to provide a high and constant level of QoE involves an extensive network of actors, each having its own strategy and chasing different goals. This paper analyses the varying objectives of the actors by applying the multi-actor multi-issue method MACTOR.