Data Space for Manufacturing (deployment)

Topic description

ExpectedOutcome:

Deliverables

The awarded proposal(s) will set up and deploy data space(s) for manufacturing at scale, which will stay available after the runtime of the project, delivering industrial data sharing among manufacturing companies and service providers. The solutions must be characterized by a high degree of userorientation in terms of trustworthiness, data sovereignty of the companies and manageability.

More specifically, awarded proposal(s) will need to deliver:

• Technical infrastructure for the deployment of the Common European Manufacturing Data Space(s).
• Data governance documentation, comprising a set of rules of legislative, administrative and contractual nature covering access rights, processing, using and sharing data in a trustful and transparent manner.
• Code of conduct and contract template.
• Guidance/training documents for the stakeholders willing to join the data space(s).
• Once the data space(s) is/are deployed: quarterly and on an ad hoc basis reporting on usage, problems detected, and solutions provided.

Objective

The goal of this action is to significantly scale up the deployment and use of the data space(s) for manufacturing by reaching a critical mass of manufacturing industries sharing industrial data and improving company operations. In addition, the action aims to support data-driven transition to a greener and circular economy, also by enabling new business models, for example, those based on a Manufacturing-As-A-Service approach and extended Reality for industrial virtual worlds. The action will also contribute to the implementation of measures that accelerate the twin green and digital transition of manufacturing industries, such as the proposed Net Zero Industry Act as part of the Green Deal Industrial Plan.

Scope

Proposal(s) for this action need to target one of the following two use cases:

• Data-driven models for supply chain management and the role of data sharing in risk mitigation and response. Awarded proposal(s) will perform agile supply chain management and execution by continuously monitoring and exchanging status data on e.g. purchase orders, sales orders, inventory levels, order progress, demand and other forecasts, raw materials, chemicals and energy use and supply, etc. across segments of the value chain.
• Manufacturing data spaces using data to drive the transition to a greener and circular economy with enhanced business opportunities for industrial data value added services. End users are machine users, machine vendors, maintenance service providers, and remanufacturers.

The data spaces will specifically enable the compliance with standards and norms, including environmental requirements, product passports, and tax regimes.

The awarded proposal(s) should implement a secure, fair and trustworthy way of making data usable between actors in the value chain on the basis of voluntary agreements, in view of completing, deepening and expanding data sharing with other organisations. The implementation will need to be Data Act-compliant.

In addition, the proposal(s) for this action need to address the following mandatory activities:

• Bringing together relevant stakeholders to conclude data agreement(s) with reference to design, reuse, recycling, and environmental impact and indicators for continuous monitoring and exchange of data on product performance and reuse, material content and origin, feedback to design, product recycling, product remanufacturing, etc. Carrying out further activities to effectively track and report resource use (e.g. CO2) from a manufacturer’s perspective. Actions should preferably target data sharing for circularity in line with the Circular Economy Action plan (COM(2020) 98 final).

The action shall build on the results and recommendations of the preparatory actions under the previous WP. As the manufacturing sector is diverse and complex, the action specifically focuses on data spaces addressing management of supply chains.

Furthermore, there should be cooperation with the European Digital Innovation Hubs for broad uptake by industry as well as the Testing and Experimentation Facility for Manufacturing to define European test and training data sets and to provide support in their establishment.

The awarded proposal(s) will use, where possible and when available, the smart cloud-to-edge middleware platform Simpl. They will also work in close partnership with the Data Spaces Support Centre in order to ensure alignment with the rest of the ecosystem of data spaces implemented with the support of Digital Europe Programme, in particular in view of a data spaces reference architecture; common building blocks, toolboxes and standards; and data governance models. Right from the outset, the awarded proposal(s) is/are expected to work towards achieving financial sustainability by the conclusion of the action.

To measure outcomes, the proposals in this action will identify specific KPIs in the following areas:

• Business: increase of organisations participating in the Data Space, their geographical distribution and return on investment
• Technical: volume, quality and value of data exchanged; analysis of data actually used by several actors in the value chain
• Deployment: share of supplier/customer interaction having undergone automation, share of SMEs among data providers and data users.

The active participation of data providers and users from the projects’ inception is highly recommended since it will ensure that the data space is designed and structured to meet their needs, making the data space more relevant and leading to increased adoption rates and a stronger sense of ownership of data providers and users by the end of the projects’ runtime.