FEM IoT

Who is the project aimed at

Technology and industrial companies in Catalonia, particularly those involved in the Internet of Things (IoT), smart cities, mobility, energy and ICT. It is also aimed at research centres, universities and public administrations interested in technological innovation and digitalisation.

Project objective

To promote research, technology transfer and strategic collaboration in the field of IoT in order to improve the competitiveness of Catalonia's industrial sector, fostering the development of shared solutions, preventing fragmentation and ensuring interoperability between technologies.

Project description

Twelve research centres and universities in Catalonia have established the FEM-IoT cluster, one of nine clusters accredited by the Government of Catalonia to develop and transfer emerging technologies. FEM-IoT is co-funded by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), with a budget of €2 million, and involves leading institutions in connectivity, sensing, computing, cybersecurity and energy efficiency. It will promote two projects focused on smart cities. The first, “Connected Street Infrastructure”, coordinated by i2CAT, will develop an overall architecture for urban connectivity, incorporating low-power technologies for connected devices and preparing for the challenges of smart mobility, autonomous vehicles and drones. The second project, “Harnessing IoT Data”, led by CIMNE, aims to unify hardware and software standards to facilitate the large-scale collection, sharing and use of urban data. It will focus on two use cases in Barcelona: monitoring energy flows in streets and managing mobility and traffic.

Massive data collection is one of the main characteristics of IoT platforms. Global interoperability between hardware and software infrastructures is generally based on standards. However, since the IoT landscape is constantly evolving and lacks centralised technical coordination and control, many different proposals and standards are expected to emerge in the coming years. This will lead to greater heterogeneity and, consequently, increased difficulty in connecting data. FEM-IoT aims to unify hardware and software standards capable of integrating, interconnecting and merging heterogeneous data analytics platforms to build large-scale interoperable ecosystems and, in turn, enable the development of new services on these platforms.

Project funded by the European Union's European Regional Development Fund under the Catalonia ERDF Operational Programme 2014–2020