Living Labs Added Value – Best Practice Cases from ENoLL Effective members

Manchester Living Lab

Manchester Living Lab, working through the Manchester Digital trade association (www.manchesterdigital.com) which represents more than 200 companies, mainly SMEs, in the digital sector. The Living Lab is a part of Manchester City Council, also work closely with the other 9 municipalities in the Greater Manchester City Region. Manchester Living Lab has a portfolio 10 running projects with 250 end-users approximately with max. 50 tests running per year.

Manchester Living Lab counts approximately 10 local authorities, 3 universities, 10 NGOs, 1 trade association representing 200+ businesses to be the external customers i.e using the Living Lab services.

Manchester Living Lab counts as Manchester Digital Lab (MadLab) as one of its success cases, which is a creative space run by and for digital/creative activists which acts as a catalyst for networking and innovation which brings together very diverse people, businesses and new ideas.

For more information about Manchester Living Lab. 

Forum Virium Helsinki (Helsinki Living Lab)

Helsinki Living Lab, established in 2006, by 14 major corporate partners from telecommunications, ICT, retail, city infrastructure and media sectors. The City of Helsinki being one of the key stakeholders, other public sector partners include funding agencies (TEKES and SITRA), research organisations (VTT, Aalto University and EIT) and government departments (Ministry of Communications, FInVera) with seven major projects running currently with numerous sub-projects including user-driven open innovation methodologies with varying amount of users, depending on the project status, most often about 1000 users.

The success cases listed by the Helsinki Living Lab include among others the following Spin offs and/or success cases:

• Connected Day, photo diary for kindergartens (folded in 2010 as the entrepreneur made a breakthrough with Angry Birds)
• Spin Off: Adfore, hyperlocal service platform operator (originated form a VTT pilot project)
• Pilot (in a roll-out phase): Helsinki Health Card (by Medixine Ltd). Personal health record aimed at finding the chronic lifestyle diabetes patients (diabetes, cardiac problems) in an early phase. Quality award of 2011 by the Finnish Quality Association.
• Pilot (in a roll-out phase): Home healthcare video alarm (by Tunstall Ltd., City of Helsinki). Video connection to customers´ homes linked to alarm bracelets, making it possible to discuss with the patient. Has cut down unnecessary house-calls by 25%.

I2CAT Foundation

I2CAT Foundation (www.i2cat.net, 2003) is the leader of an alliance of seven living labs in the region of Catalonia, under the name of CATLAB, Catalonia Living Labs:

1. i2cat Foundation, www.i2cat.net , 2003

2. 22@, www.22barcelona.com/, 2000,

3. Citilab, www.citilab.net, 2007

4. Tecnocampus Mataro, www.tecnocampusmataro.cat,

5. .net, www.guifi.net,

6. Neapolis, www.neapolis.cat,

7. BDigital, www.bdigital.cat.

i2cat is organized as a PPP with the active participation of the companies part of the Board of the Foundation (mainly in the areas of ICT and media): Alcatel, Vodafone, Orange, CISCO, Fujitsu, Juniper networks, Mediapro, Cromosoma, CCMA, Corporacio Catalana de Mitjans Audiovisual. i2cat Foundation is headed by the Generalitat of Catalonia, the regional government (three Departments, Research, Industry and Health) and participated also by the City of Barcelona.

Besides i2cat is cooperating in a permanent basis through i2cat Clusters in the area of networking, media, mobile, health, industry and education, engaging each of the cluster between 10 and 50 companies and many end-users and citizens.

Finally in the CATLAB consortium each of the living lab involves a broad range of companies mainly from the IT sector:

• 22@ is the Barcelona innovation district (with the participation of the city of Barcelona),
• BDigital, supported by the Department of Industry, Generalitat of Catalonia, manages the Barcelona IT cluster,
• Tecnocampus Mataro, participated by the municipality of Mataro, involves a cluster of IT companies in the city,
• Neapolis, headed by the City of Vilanova i la Geltru, involves a group of IT companies in the City,
• Citilab, headed by the City of  Cornella de Llobregat , involves a group of IT companies in the city and many citizens,
• Guifi.net, a non-for-profit private foundation without public participation, is a Living Lab built with collaboration of a cluster of IT companies in rural Catalonia region.

Thanks to projects like Cultural Ring, i2cat has developed a new eInfrastructure concept and facility called “the Innovation Rings”. The Cultural Ring, connected to the NREN (National Research and Education Network), connects more than 10 different cultural centers in 5 different cities in Catalonia. The Industrial Ring connects more than 30 companies and research centers, mainly from the automobile cluster (http://www.anellaindustrial.cat/). This new concept of innovation rings allows a more coordinated activity between the research and the innovation community in Catalonia.

The different CATLAB living Labs make use of European, national and regional funding instruments to deliver research and innovation capabilities. At European level i2cat is currently running one European project with Citilab and the City of Barcelona called iCity, 22@ is participating in the CIP PSP Smart City Open Cities project led by ESADE and finally in the European Project INDICATE on digital cultural heritage, i2CAT has opened a new activity of Living labs that is helping to create a new eCulture area in the ENoLL community and a closed collaboration with EUROPEANA. At a national and regional level the initiatives listed below help to provide a good view on the activities performed by the CATLAB Living Labs in the educational, social innovation, user participation and job creation areas:

• RECECO, a Citilab project funded by the Spanish Minister of Industry, to create a platform for Knowledge Centers in Spain.
• Laborlab, a Citilab project funded by the Employment Department of regional government, developing a new approach to employment policies based on Living Lab methodologies
• Huerto Digital (or Digital Horchad) a Personal Learning Environment for introducing innovative projects at the Educational System in Catalonia.

Only Citilab involves more than 5.000 end users registered in the Living Lab (see the full range of current projects at www.citilab.eu)

Guifi.net has more than 15.000 nodes created by their respective community of users. New spin offs have been born as result of the Living Lab activity (e.g. Iglor http://www.iglor.es/content/)

As result of all these years of collaboration through a PPP model of Living labs, the Generalitat of Catalaonia and the City of Barcelona has got the contract with the GSMA to be considered the Mobile World Capital for next years until 2018.

This may be considered as the more visible success case in the CATLAB community. This agreement will include the creation of a Mobile World Lab, transforming the whole City of Barcelona in a living lab with the latest mobile technologies. It will include also a Cultural Festival open to living labs creative activities (http://www.mobileworldcapital.com/barca_video.htm). 

More information here.

IBBT iLab.o

There has been continuous Living Lab research at the SMIT (VUB) and MICT (UGhent) from 2003 onwards.

• Foundation of IBBT (Interdisciplinary Institute for Broadband Technology), an independent research institute founded by the Flemish government to stimulate ICT innovation in 2004 merging IBBT SMIT and IBBT MICT
• i-City wireless Living Lab initiative in the City of Hasselt 2005
• IBBT SMIT, IBBT MICT and i-City merge and transform their LL operations into iLab.o in 2006 -2008, counting up 40-50 Living Labs projects so far, with test users typically between 50 – 500 individuals

Early success cases:

• DTV Living Lab, pioneer in LL project in digital television in Flanders in 300 households (2003-2004) with market share of app. 70% in Flanders and income from digital subscriptions 340 mio euros yearly.
• E-Paper (2005- 2006) to assess the feasibility for distribution and consumption of newspapers on eReader devices, with results of problems with timing, technology limitations, etc. and finally identification for other opportunities and alternative business models such as BOOKS (validated by the success of Kindle…) and iTunes model.

Public Private investments in Living Labs in Flanders (2005 -2012)

• i-City (start budget 3, 6 mio EUR, with industry investment o 1,8 mio EUR (a.o partners such as Microsoft)
• Flemish Living Lab platform (total budget 2,8 mio EUR, with industry investment of 1.4 mio EUR)
• LeyLab (total budget 800 k EUR, industry investment 50 % (Alcatel Lucent, Belgacom)
• Media Garden (total budget 800 k EUR, 250 k EUR from industry)
• Electical Vehicles (total budget of 25 mio EUR, including 16,25 mio EUR and 9 mio EUR directly from industry)

Recent success cases:

• InCitys (2010-2011) within Flemish Living Lab, a concept to commercial roll-out of smart city platform, involving 75 households with 250 users and 25 shops. Large commercial roll-out targets 4000 households, with plans to expand in other European cities.
• Mobile Living Lab becomes a Mobile Service Provider Business Mobile Vikings growing from the i-City LL activities, a new unique model in Europe, where no marketing, no sales team, no stores, contracts or call center but viral marketing and mobile social network. Spectacular growth with currently 77. 000 customers and to (15-20 mio EUR/ yearly business, with expansion to other countries is foreseen.

More information here.

ESPAITEC, eLiving Lab

iLivingLab (ESPAITEC, Science and Technology Park (STP) of Castellon (SPAIN), 2010), involves in the Living Lab operations 15 FTEs from 8 different SMEs, and 7 R&D groups from the University. They commonly participate in the co-creation and development of different projects inside the Living Lab. The SMEs involved are and ongoing projects listed below give a good inside in the topics, industry and users involved in the living lab:

SMEs:

• 4TIC – Ecologic footprint – control of pollution produced by cars in Campus
• AWD – Ecologic footprint – control of energy consumption of streetlights at Campus
• BIOTICA – Biotechnology – Legionella Quick Kit (Manned and unmanned)
• CITE TRADE – Logistics – Control of books at University Library
• CITE TRADE – Health/Sports – Control of running training at University Sports infrastructures
• COGNITIVE ROBOTS – Robotics – Telepresence robots for videoconferences and robotic doorman.
• DOUBLEEXPERIENCE – Information Point and by means of multitouch screens
• INGESOM — Ecologic footprint – control of temperature in server management
• XOP FISICA – Control of water consumption at gardens based on sensoring technology
• R&D Groups:
• LABCOM – Audiovisual platform
• INDUSTRIAL DESIGN – Ecologic footprint – Solar Tree
• INIT – Analysis of social movement at the Campus based on social triggers.
• TECLAB – Control of student’s attendance following Bolonia rules
• TECLAB – POS for students registering process (payment platform using NFC mobiles)
• TECLAB – ecologic footprint – control of energy consumption in the Campus buildings

The University of Castellon in fully involved at the Living Lab and approximately one tenth of University Campus community (more than 500) participate in projects. Currently three products have already reached the market: BIOTICA (Legionella Kit), XOP (Control of water consumption), AWD (Control of electrical streetlights) and all the others are on their way.

iLivingLab plans are to engage the full University Campus community (around 15.000) interacting with all the projects and as such as part of this recently created but already successful Living Lab.

More information here.

Human Tech Living Lab / Lutakko Living Lab

Human Tech Living Lab, founded in 2008, with different City partnerships, entities working with Urban Design & Service/ ICT Design of Public Services with 15 projects running currently (2011) with +/- 200 end-users and +/- 10 external customers for the Living Lab. The services/products in the market, Lutakko Living Lab describers the following:

• New service (1), developed services (5) via Lutakko
• ilutakko.fi development concept
• Touristic (www.sdt.fi)
• Sokos Hotel Paviljonki
• Public Service Development

More information here.