News archive 2008

Organised on January 22, 2009 by the European Commission's Information Society and Media Directorate-General in cooperation with the Hungarian National Office for Research and Technology, ICT Proposers' Day 2009 (ppt downloadable here) is a one day event aiming at providing already existing and future project participants with a unique opportunity to familiarise themselves with the research challenges and objectives of ICT Work Programme 2009-2010, and to form project consortia for participating in calls for proposals. The event, in which over 2000 delegates are expected to participate, will take place at Hungexpo, in Budapest, Hungary, and should be the occasion to strengthen or identify proposals with South Korean participation to be submitted at ICT Call 4. For further information, please visit the event web site.

The COJAK FP7/ICT project benefited from a high visibility at the ICT 2008 EVENT - Europe biggest ICT research event - that took place in Lyon (France) this week (25-27 Nov. 2008).

More than 4,500 delegates attended the 2008 edition of the major conference and exhibition organised every two years by the European Commission’s DG Information Society and Media, making Lyon one of the best-attended ICT Events ever. The event presented Europe's priorities for ICT research, development and funding. Leading personalities in the ICT sector from all around the world looked at how Europe can lead the ICT agenda for the next decade. The COJAK FP7/ICT project hosted an exhibition booth in the International Village that welcomed a wide range of visitors as well as many questions from international event participants interested in preparing proposals in response to FP7 ICT Calls including partners from South Korea/Japan. Information on the project was distributed to visitors including information on the upcoming "2nd EU-Korea Cooperation Forum on ICT Research" co-organised by the European Commission and the Ministry of Knowledge Economy (MKE), ROK to be held next week on Dec. 1 & 2, 2008 in Brussels, Belgium. A networking session was also organised on 27 November within the COJAK FP7/ICT project devoted to strategic cooperation opportunities in ICT research with Japan and South Korea. Chaired by Karine Valin, COJAK FP7/ICT Project Coordinator, this session welcomed presentations from Tabea Lumpp - COJAK project manager - on the objectives and activities within COJAK, Alvis Ancans - COJAK project officer - International Relations Unit, Directorate - General Information Society and Media (DG Infso), European Commission on "the Status & perspective of cooperation on ICT research between Europe and Japan / South Korea under FP7", as well as Seitaro Fujita – Director of the Europe representative office of the National  Institute of Information & Communications Technology (NICT) in Paris  on "ICT Research and Development at NICT of Japan". These introductory addresses  were rounded up by a video message from Sung-ok Lee – President of the Institute for Information Technology Advancement (IITA), South Korea and followed by three success stories from ongoing EU-funded projects with the participation of a Korean and/or Japanese organisations:

Dr. Werner Mohr – FUTON Project Coordinator (fibre optic networks for distributed and extendible heterogeneous radio architectures - collaborative project with the participation of a Japanese organisation)

Prof. Dr. Frank van Harmelen – LARKC Scientific Project Director (large scale semantic computing semantic Web technologies distributed reasoning probabilistic reasoning web-scale inference information retrieval - collaborative project with the participation of a South Korean organisation) 

Prof. Anthony Furness – CASAGRAS Technical Coordinator (Coordination and support action for global RFID-related activities and standardisation - coordination and support action with the participation of a Japanese and a South Korean organisation) 

Well attended, this session ended with fruitful and very enriching discussions between European and Japanese/South Korean stakeholders.

The Networking session agenda can be downloaded here.

For any further information, please contact us.

The Europe's biggest research event for ICT will be held on 25-27 November 2008 in Lyon, France. At ICT2008, the COJAK FP7/ICT project will contribute to the strengthening and support of ICT research strategic cooperation between Europe and Japan as well as Europe and South Korea through

• a dedicated Networking Sessions (Strategic cooperation opportunities with Japan and Korea) featuring high-profile experts from South Korea and Japan. Talks will be followed by a Q&A session and in-depth discussions. Please click here to download the Networking session agenda
• an Exhibition Stand (D18) in the International Village featuring material from the COJAK Project / material from EU-funded projects involving Japanese and South Korean partners / documents (as electronic formats) addressing ICT research cooperation with Japan and South Korea / networking opportunities with key stakeholders in the field. Contact us urgently should you wish to display any relevant marketing material.

For more information about ICT2008, please visit the or contact us directly.

A new White Paper 2008 has been released by the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications (MIC), Japan this month. Detailed information on the status and perspectives of the ICT sector in Japan can be accessed through this document.

This White Paper consists of the following 3 chapters:

1. Realization of Dynamic Ubiquitous Network Society
2. Current Status of Information and Communications
3. Outlook for Information and Telecommunications Policies

Please click here to download the White Paper 2008.

On the 24 September 2008, the European Commission called on governments to jointly develop a strategy for international cooperation in science and technology. It proposed a strategic framework for jointly strengthening science and technology cooperation with non-EU countries, notably in the field of Information and Communication Technologies where Europe is a strong exporter. The Commission's objective is to contribute to sustainable development worldwide while at the same time improving Europe’s competitiveness in science and technology. The Commission invites Member States to define together, rather than in isolation, priority research and technology areas where a coherent EU effort would have more impact.

The full text of the Communication of the European Commission can be downloaded here as a pdf file

In search of the best strategies to boost Europe's leadership in ICT (Information and Communications Technology) research and innovation in the next decade, the European Commission today launched a public consultation. Contributions from industry, ICT experts, policy-makers and the wider public will be fed into a new strategy for ICT research and innovation, to be unveiled next year. The aim is to put European ICT industry, especially SMEs, to the fore of the race for global competitiveness. The public consultation is open until 7 November 2008.

The Commission's public consultation document can be accessed here while the corresponding press release can be downloaded here.

Today, two calls targeting Japan as country were opened under the international cooperation area of the FP7 Capacities programme covering the following activities:

• Bilateral coordination for the enhancement and development of S&T Partnerships
• Supporting the EU access to third country programmes

The Commission’s proposals for the FP7 Capacities programme aim to enhance research and innovation capacities throughout Europe and ensure their optimal use. The Capacities programme is provided with a budget of EUR 4 097 million to operate in seven broad areas:

• Research infrastructures
• Research for the benefit of SMEs
• Regions of knowledge and support for regional research-driven clusters
• Research potential of Convergence Regions
• Science in society
• Support to the coherent development of research policies
• International cooperation

Objective of the international cooperation under the FP7 Capacities programme

To become more competitive and play a leading role globally, the European Community needs a strong and coherent international science and technology (S&T) policy with three objectives:

• support European competitiveness through strategic partnerships with non-EU countries in selected fields of science and by engaging the best scientists from such countries to work with and in Europe;
• enhance the production of knowledge and scientific excellence by enabling European universities, research institutions and firms to establish contacts with their partners in such third countries, thereby facilitating access to research environments outside Europe and promoting synergies on a global scale;
• address specific problems that third countries face, or that have a global character, on the basis of mutual interest and mutual benefit.

Please click here to access the latest published calls.

Call Fiche: Activities of International Cooperation BILAT
Call Fiche: Activities of International Cooperation - ACCESS4EU
Work Programme Capacities – Part 7 – Activities of International cooperation

The first live demonstration of a working quantum key distribution (QKD) network will take place in Vienna on October 8-10, 2008 in the framework of the SECOQC international conference. Seven technologically different QKD-links will be combined to form the SECOQC Quantum-Back-Bone network, physically connecting five company sites of SIEMENS Austria in Vienna and the neighbouring capital of Lower Austria, St. Poelten.

The building blocks that are necessary to bring QKD networks to the market will be presented. Interfacing with existing business applications is demonstrated for voice telephony and video conferencing, secured by keys distributed over the SECOQC Quantum-Back-Bone network.

Also included in the conference program is the kick-off of the ETSI Industry Specification Group on Quantum Cryptography and Quantum Technologies - an output of the SECOQC standardisation initiative.

Invited speakers include Artur Ekert, Yoshihisa Yamamoto, Hoi-Kwong Lo, Masahide Sasaki and Jacques Bus (European Commission). However, it will also be possible to present your own contribution in fields related to quantum key distribution. The submission deadline is June 16, 2008 to fix all talks (few slots are available). All other contributions - including late submissions until September 15 – will be considered for posters. Notifications of acceptance will be given continuously.

For more information, please contact Andreas Poppe or visit the SECOQC website.

The 1st EU-Japan ICT Cooperation Workshop in the framework of the COJAK project was kindly hosted by the Delegation of the European Commission to Japan the 20th of May 2008.
For the sake of efficiency, only approx. 20 attendees participated in this half-day workshop and were composed of a good mix of industries and academies, and of Japanese and European organisations based in Japan, with some good experience of EU-Japan cooperation on ICT research, in particular of FP6-FP7 projects.

The objectives of the workshop were to:

• continue the dialogue established since the 2008 EU-Japan Cooperation Forum on ICT Research held in March of this year on Tokyo,
• better prepare the “2nd EU-Japan Cooperation Forum on ICT Research” to be held in the near future in Europe,
• discuss with European and Japanese organisations already (or interested in being) involved in EU-Japan cooperation on ICT research problems and potential solutions related to the present development of EU-Japan cooperation on ICT research.

The largest part of the workshop was devoted to an open discussion addressing the three main identified discussion topics:

• Connection: which connection opportunities do European and Japanese organisations need: Forums or focused workshops, online facilities, etc.?
• Information: how to improve the information of organisations from both regions on cooperation opportunities (in particular Japanese SMEs and Universities: a specific target of the foreseen EU-Japan cooperation under FP7)?
• Funding: what solutions can ensure a stronger participation: match funding, coordinated calls, etc.?

A networking cocktail was given to conclude the workshop and permitted to continue discussions in a more informal way.

A 2nd EU-Japan ICT Cooperation workshop will take place in the near future in Europe.

All workshop relevant documents used during the 1st EU-Japan ICT Cooperation Workshop on May 20, 2008 can be downloaded here:

Workshop minutes
Attendee list
Workshop introduction, Roger Torrenti - COJAK project advisor
Kunikasu Imai (ppt), Freelancer
Shintaro Uno (ppt), Motorola Japan Research Lab
Gerhard Fasol, Eurotechnology Japan KK

For any further information you might need, please feel free to contact us.

The newly created EuroJapan-ICT Community, that aims at efficiently and actively contributing to the further development of S&T cooperation between Europe and Japan in the ICT field, was put online today.

This community section has been created in order to support the efforts of the community of European and Japanese organisations (companies, research institutes, universities, etc.) involved in, or interested in the development of joint R&D projects.

It is a restricted area where short profiles, ID pictures and contact information (email addresses) of representatives from European and Japanese organisations willing to benefit from a very targeted contact network, are listed.

Other functionalities will be progressively added to this Community area, such as online discussion forums or collaborative work tools, so that the “Community of interest” constituted in a first step can evolve towards a true “Community of practice”. This evolution will be driven by the suggestions of the members of the Community of interest, with the sole objective to better serve their interests.

If you wish to get a member of this Community and in order to have access to the complete list of the community members, just fill-in the application form.

For any further information you might need, feel free to contact us

Dr. Joao Da Silva, and Dr Mario Campolargo, both Directors in DG Information Society and Media of the European Commission and responsible for research in the field of the Internet of the Future, invite all interested parties to the 1st Japan EU Symposium on the "New Generation Network" and the "Future of the Internet" and co-organised with the Japanese NICT.

Japan has started ambitious work in the field of the Internet of the Future. The purpose of the event will be to exchange views on activities related to the Internet of the Future, to take stock of developments and future plans in the EU and in Japan, and to explore possibilities of future collaboration in the field with Japan. A possible instrument to materialise such co-operation will be offered through our next ICT research work programme and covering the period 2009-10, currently in discussion with the Member States.

Please find more details under www.ict-fireworks.eu <BLOCKED::file:///\\www.ict-fireworks.eu>. Participation to the event is free. As space is limited, please register by 18 Mai 2008.

Contact:

Bernard Barani
Assistant to the Director
European Commission, DG INFSO
Directorate D
"Converged Networks and Services"
Bernard.Barani@ec.europa.eu    

Dr. Max Lemke
Deputy Head of Unit
European Commission, DG INFSO
Directorate F
"Emerging technologies and Infrastructures"
Max.Lemke@ec.europa.eu

Two articles, one about the ASIACOOP project (IST-3-15695-SSA), the other one about its follow-up project called COJAK (ICT-216949), have been put on the English version of the collaborative free encyclopedia Wikipedia this week.

Both projects are so-called Coordination and Support Actions (CSA) submitted under the European Commission’s Framework Programme for Research and Technological Development (FP6 and FP7) and focusing on developing and strengthening EU-Japan as well as EU-Korean S&T cooperation in the ICT field.

The ASIACOOP article can be accessed by clicking here, whereas the COJAK contribution can be looked up while clicking here. The EU-Japan ICT community is welcomed to add any additional relevant information on EU-Japan ICT cooperation projects.

In the framework of the COJAK project (Further developing strategic cooperation with Japan and South Korea on ICT), a successfully selected project at Call 1 under FP7, a “1st EU-Japan Cooperation ICT Workshop” will be organised in the afternoon on May 20, 2008 in Tokyo in the premises of the Delegation of the European Commission to Japan.

The objectives of this 1/2-day (afternoon) workshop are amongst others to:

• continue the dialogue established since the March Forum
• better prepare the “2nd EU-Japan Cooperation Forum on ICT Research”, which will take place on Oct. 20 & 21, 2008 in Brussels
• discuss (not on a political, but more “operational” level) about the problems and potential solutions to really make happen S&T cooperation between Europe and Japan

Potential questions to be raised during the workshop could be for instance:

• What are the problems the institutes/universities/research labs face and hinder them to really make cooperation in the ICT field with their European/Japanese counterparts?
• Is there a lack of information (missing information for Japanese organisations) with regard to FP7?
• Would it be appropriate that each government guarantees the funding of one of each of its organisations involved in a consortium selected by the other government ?
• The perspective of coordinated - if not joint - calls, the reciprocity issues (participation of European organisations in Japanese funded research projects), etc.

The opinion/point of view of European and Japanese organizations active in the ICT field on the reasons, why the real number of EU-Japan cooperation projects under FP7 for instance is still so low despite its high potential, is in the center of this workshop.

For the sake of efficiency, and for really enabling a fruitful discussion/round table, the number of workshop participants is limited to 20-25 persons. Thus, if you are interested, please make sure that you register soon. (Registration is free of charge).

Please feel free to contact us for any question you might have.

The final statistics of the two first FP7 Calls related to the ICT theme (Call 1 deadline: May 8, 2007; Call 2 deadline: Oct. 9, 2007) are now available. A total of 17 participations of Japanese organisations in proposals submitted in response to these Calls have been recorded (8 for Call1, 9 for Call2), which, after the proposal evaluation process, became 7 projects (all retained proposals in Call 1). Among these 7 retained projects are: GRIFS (The Global RFID Interoperability Forum for Standards), CASAGRAS (Coordination and Support Action for Global RFID-related Activities and Standardisation), EMIME (Effective Multilingual Interaction in Mobile Environments), KYOTO (Knowledge Yielding Ontologies for Transition-based Organization), FUTON (Fiber Optic Networks for Distributed, Extendible Heterogeneous Radio Architecture and Service Provisioning), ITALK (Integration and Transfer of Action and Language Knowledge in robotics), and CAPSIL (Common Awareness and Knowledge Platform for Studying and Enabling Independent Living). Full details on these projects can be found on the Cordis web site.

These results unfortunately show the current low level of participation of Japanese organisations in submitted and retained proposals despite the high potential of mutually beneficial S&T cooperation between Europe and Japan.

It is the objective of the actual ongoing ASIACOOP initiative, but also the newly launched COJAK project (fact sheet), representing a follow-up project of the ASIACOOP initiative, to fully contribute to significantly increase the participation of Korean organisation in FP7.

The “2008 EU-Japan The 2008 EU-Japan Cooperation Forum on ICT Research was successfully held yesterday and today at the Mita Kaigisho Conference Hall of the Japanese Government in Tokyo. It was co-organised by the European Commission (DG Information Society and Media), and four Japanese Ministries: the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications (MIC), the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA), the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT), and the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI).

A total of 320 delegates had registered for the event, among them 85 European delegates (either based in Japan or in Europe: 45 delegates coming from 15 European countries), representing the industry (around 40%), the academic world (30%) and institutions (30%).

The event opening session, chaired by Dr. Philippe de Taxis du Poet - First Counsellor - Delegation of the European Commission to Japan, included addresses from H.E. Miran Skender - Ambassador of Slovenia in Japan, Mr. Kiyoshi Mori - Vice Minister for Policy Coordination (International Affairs), MIC, Mr. Hideichi Okada - Director-General for Commerce and Information Policy Bureau, METI, H.E. Hugh Richardson - Ambassador, Head of the Delegation of the European Commission to Japan, and Mr. Fabio Colasanti - Director-General, DG Information Society and Media, European Commission.

During his speech, Mr. Colasanti underlined that the present level of cooperation on ICT research between Europe and Japan was too low, when considering the need and the will expressed by both sides. He shared his confidence that the present Forum could be a milestone in the reinforcement of this cooperation, and that a new phase would open, facilitated by the EU-Japan S&T agreement that should be signed in the near future.

The opening session was followed by a media briefing during which Mr. Colasanti and Mr. Mori had the opportunity to interact with Japanese journalists. A press article published on March 4 in the Kyodo News can be accessed here.

Then, another plenary session, chaired by Mr. Hiroya Izumi - Director of International Economic Affairs Division, MIC, was devoted to keynote addresses from representatives of the European and Japanese industry and academic world: Mr. Chiaki Ito - Corporate Senior Executive, Vice President and Representative Director Fujitsu, Ltd., Dr. Horst Melcher - President, Deutsche Telekom Japan, Prof. Yasuhiko Arakawa - Professor, The University of Tokyo, and Prof. Abderrahmane Kheddar - Co-director of the AIST-CNRS Joint Japanese-French Robotics Laboratory.

Then, the event was structured into parallel sessions, each of them devoted to a specific theme: e-Transport, Nanoelectronics, Photonic Network Technology, Networked Electronic Media, Next Generation Information Retrieval and Analysis Technologies, Ubiquitous Network Technology, New Generation Network, and RFID.

These parallel sessions allowed participants to better understand the research status and perspectives on the different themes in Europe and in Japan, and to more precisely evaluate the potential for future cooperation in each area, in particular under the European 7th Research Programme (FP7), introduced in detail by Mr. Alvis Ancans - International Relations Unit - DG Information Society and Media - European Commission, during the specific information plenary session that took place at the end of the first day.

The closing session, chaired by Dr. Stephan Pascall, Adviser - Directorate Components & Systems - DG Information Society and Media - European Commission, and Mr. Atsushi Umino, Deputy Director of International Economic Affairs Division, MIC allowed the Chairmen of the parallel sessions to present overviews of the discussions and conclusions related to their sessions. The closing session led indeed to truly take stock of the two days and highlight an important potential for the future, which planned dialogues and events in the next months should contribute transforming into concrete projects.

The detailed conference agenda, allowing to download all presentations made during the two days will be made available here in the coming days, while the attendee list can be downloaded here and a selection of pictures taken during the event can be accessed here.

For any further information, please contact us.

Two weeks prior to the “2008 EU-Japan Cooperation Forum on ICT Research”, the organisers record a more than satisfactorily development of the organisation of the Forum. More than 175 interested persons registered, amongst them approx. 70 Europeans and more than 110 Japanese, with new registrations each day. The initial objective of about 100-150 participants is thus largely exceeded, 14 days prior to the Cooperation Event.

Besides Mr. Fabio Colasanti (Director General DG Information Society and Media – European Commission), H.E. Hugh Richardson (EU ambassador, Head of the Delegation of the European Commission to Japan), H.E. Miran Skender (Slovenian ambassador), and representatives of Japanese Ministries opening the Forum on March 4, high-level speakers from Europe and Japan have been selected making the programme an interesting and varied one. The final event agenda will be soon made available on this website.

With regard to the Technical Visits organised exclusively for European delegates, only few placed are left to register. A short advance information: the Panasonic Center Tokyo as well as the Central Research Laboratory, Hitachi Ltd. will be visited. The final programme will be also made available in the coming days on the EuroJapan-ICT website.

The ICT event 2008 will take place in Lyon, France from Nov. 25 to 27. This conference-exhibition, organised by the European Commission's DG Information Society and Media, is the Europe's biggest research event devoted to Information and Communication Technologies. The previous one was held in November 2006 in Helsinki. The 2008 edition, entitled “I's to the future - Invention, Innovation, Impact”, will provide delegates from all over the world (researchers, innovators, engineers, policy and business decision-makers, etc.) with a key opportunity to access and exchange information, and network. Over 4000 participants are expected. Full details can be found on the event web site.

Only one month left until the “2008 EU-Japan Cooperation Forum on ICT Research”, which is co-organised by the European Commission (DG Information Society and Media) and the Japanese Ministries (MIC, MOFA, MEXT, METI).

As of today, there are approximately 100 registered event attendees with an upward tendency, due to new registrations each day. High-level profiles from industry, SME, research laboratories and academia characterize valuably the attendee list, which can be downloaded here.

The programme is almost finalized and all European as well as Japanese speakers are nearly selected.

The preliminary agenda for the Technical Visits, exclusively organised for European delegates on March 6, is also almost concretized: In the morning there will be a guided tour at the ”National Institute of Information and Communications Technology” (NICT) laboratory and in the afternoon the “Fujitsu Exhibition hall and laboratory” in Kawasaki city will be visited. However, please note: subject to alteration! Thanks for your kind understanding and for your patience.

We are looking forward to meeting you soon in Tokyo!

For any further information, please contact us or stay tuned with the regularly updated EuroJapan-ICT.org website!