Euro-India SPIRIT

Interview with Mounib Mekhilef, Ability Europe at eWORLD 2011

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 10:56:24 GMT

In this interview Mounib Mekhilef, Ability Europe Ltd., talks about the Euro-India SPIRIT focus and efforts in supporting international collaboration and setting up a common roadmap for future research activities, leveraging on previous initiatives and covering towards common goals, with input and insights from both Indian and European sides.
Looking forward to the Euro-India SPIRIT Workshop at Copenhagen Co-Creation Conference, Mounib Mekhilef gives a preview of the future Recommendations the Euro-India SPIRIT Project is to publish by the end of 2011.

Aakash - The Indian computer tablet that could herald an internet revolution

Tue, 17 Jan 2012 15:36:00 GMT

Indian computer tablet could herald an internet revolution

From the BBC: Aakash device is cheap and will, say enthusiasts, help overcome problems with literacy and skills – especially in rural areas. It takes the form of a computer "tablet" – a basic form of device similar to the Apple iPad – which can be made and sold for under £35. Already 100,000 of the devices, called Aakash are to be manufactured for testing. Within weeks a new version, which will allow hundreds of millions of Indians in remote rural areas to connect to the internet via local mobile phone networks, will be launched.

The government hopes to use the Aakash tablets to overcome chronic shortages in educational resources through distance learning packages. India has a shortage of a million teachers and many schools lack books or basic facilities.

With improvements in India infrastructure, access to the internet is getting better for those in rural areas although the main driver is likely not to be public investment but the private sector.

Read the full story here - http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2012/jan/12/indian-computer-tablet-aakash-internet

Euro-India SPIRIT – Harnessing EU-India ICT Research Cooperation - Report Overview

Mon, 16 Jan 2012 18:31:26 GMT

Information Communication Technologies are evolving at an unprecedented rate and are at the heart of economic growth and societal advancement in two of the world’s key global markets: India and Europe. International cooperation is crucial to addressing many of the grand challenges facing both Europe and India, particularly in terms of ensuring smart, sustainable and inclusive societies. The time is ripe to chart a course for a collaborative R&D programme to take EU-India cooperation to the next level and work towards ensuring that societies in both regions are inclusive, innovative and secure. As we move into 2012 and ever nearer to the European Commission’s next Common Strategy Framework, Horizon 2020, international collaborative ICT research is key to creating the flourishing digital economy by 2020. Europe and India have complementarities in ICT research which should be leveraged to address challenges common to both regions that can lead to mutual benefit.

This document summarises the Euro-India SPIRIT Final report The New Paradigm - Harnessing EU-India ICT Research Cooperation.

Cloud Computing and a virtual makeover for Tamil Nadu govt

Wed, 04 Jan 2012 11:26:29 GMT

The Tamil Nadu government is in the final stage of launching cloud computing to make its websites and online services faster and more efficient. The data centre is being set up by the Centre for Developing Advanced Computing (CDAC), under the communications and information technology Ministry, which will also maintain it.
Cloud computing is a technology that uses the internet and remote servers to maintain data and applications . Essentially, all government data and services will be stored virtually, instead of on different internal networks. Government employees will have to use just one web-based application to work on delivering services like issuing certificates.

More info...

GEYSERS - Generalised Architecture for Dynamic Infrastructure Services

Wed, 28 Dec 2011 12:14:00 GMT

GEYSERS's vision is to qualify optical infrastructure providers and network operators with a new architecture, to enhance their traditional business operations. Optical network infrastructure providers will compose logical infrastructures and rent them out to network operators; network operators will run cost-efficient, dynamic and mission-specific networks by means of integrated control and management techniques. GEYSERS's concept is that high-end IT resources at users' premises are fully integrated with the network services procedures, both at the infrastructure-planning and connection-provisioning phases.
Following this vision, GEYSERS will specify and implement a novel optical-network architecture able to support 'Optical Network + Any-IT' resource provisioning seamlessly and efficiently. Energy-consumption metrics for the end-to-end service routing are part of this efficiency. GEYSERS proposes to:

Specify and develop mechanisms that allow infrastructure providers to partition their resources (optical network and/or IT), compose specific logical infrastructures and offer them as a service to network operators. This will be done overcoming the current limitations of networks/domain segmentation, and will support dynamic and on-demand changes in the logical infrastructures
Specify and develop a Network Control Plane for the optical infrastructure, by extending standard solutions (ASON/GMPLS and PCE), able to couple optical network connectivity and IT services automatically and efficiently, and provide them in 1 step, dynamically and on-demand, including infrastructure re-planning mechanisms.

These achievements will enable infrastructure providers, network operators and application providers to participate in new business scenarios where complex services with complex attributes and strict bandwidth requirements can be offered economically and efficiently to users and applications. GEYSERS's outcomes will be validated in an EU-wide optical network test-bed.

GEYSERS is funded under the European Union's Seventh Framework Programme (FP7), project number 248657.

The Department of Computer Science and Engineering at the India Institute of Technology Bombay, is a key partner in GEYSER.

Euro-India SPIRIT Roadshow Presentation by Neeraj Suri: "The Why's, What's and How?s of EC Cooperation"

Fri, 23 Dec 2011 10:20:12 GMT

View the Euro-India SPIRIT Roadshow Presentation by Neeraj Suri from the Dept. of Computer Science TU Darmstadt, Germany, titled: "The Why's, What's and How?s of EC Cooperation".

Euro-India SPIRIT Roadshow Presentation by Tom Williamson : "Euro-India SPIRIT Goals and outcomes"

Fri, 23 Dec 2011 10:09:44 GMT

Euro-India SPIRIT Roadshow December 2011 presentation given by Tom Williamson, ERCIM EEIG & Euro-India SPIRIT Project Coordinator, titled "Euro-India SPIRIT Goals and outcomes".

Euro-India SPIRIT Roadshow

Wed, 07 Dec 2011 12:50:00 GMT

13 December FICCI, Federation House, Delhi

14 December Administrative Staff Colledge of India, Hyderabad

16 December eIndia2011, Gandhinagar

Economic and social development worldwide is closely related to the ability to articulate and develop policies that encourage ICT innovation and adoption and also involve all actors in society such as academia, government, business and industry.

For Indian and European ICT stakeholders the Euro-India SPIRIT Roadshow events represent a unique opportunity to participate to the strengthening of ICT dialogue and cooperation. Participants will be invited to voice their opinion on a number of issues related to Indian ICT research priorities and how they match European areas of interest. With presentations from key Indian and European ICT experts, the workshops are key for those wishing to partake in international ICT research activities

Chaired by Ashok Kar, Infra Technologies & Euro-India SPIRIT, the workshops will also see the launch of the Euro-India SPIRIT EU-India ICT Priorities Booklet which sets out a set of recommendations for future EU-India ICT collaboration in the following areas:

Future Network Infrastructure & Technologies
ICT Trust & Security
eGovernment
eInclusion
Cloud Computing

Euro-India SPIRIT Recommendations– The New Digital Paradigm: Harnessing EU-India ICT Research Cooperation

Roadshow presentations:

Tom Williamson, ERCIM EEIG & Euro-India SPIRIT Project Coordinator : "Euro-India SPIRIT Goals and outcomes"

Neeraj Suri, Dept. of Computer Science TU Darmstadt, Germany: "The Whys, Whats and Hows of EC Cooperation"

EC presents Horizon 2020

Wed, 07 Dec 2011 12:36:00 GMT

The European Commission presented on November 30 its €80 billion research funding programme for the decade - Horizon 2020 – aimed at boosting research, stimulating innovation and simplifying the way scientists and smaller businesses can get funding for EU-backed projects.
The Horizon 2020 programme brings together all EU research and innovation funding under a single scheme running from 2014 to 2020 and it replaces the Seventh Framework Programme for research (FP7), which expires in 2013.
Horizon 2020 is divided into three major pillars. The first aims to establish the EU as one of the leaders of cutting-edge projects using a €24.5-billion budget, including funding for the European Research Council (ERC). A second allocation is targeted at industrial innovation with a budget of €17.9 billion, including €13.7 billion for key technologies.The third and biggest tranche, worth €31.7 billion, goes to so-called "societal challenges" divided into six themes:
•   Health, demographic change and well-being;
•   Food security, sustainable agriculture, marine and maritime research and the bio-economy;
•   Secure, clean and efficient energy;
•   Smart, green and integrated transport;
•   Climate action, resource efficiency and raw materials; and
•   Inclusive, innovative and secure societies.
The remaining €5.9 billion is set aside for the Joint Research Centre – the Commission’s in-house research institution – which works on issues that include the environment, nanotechnology and nuclear safety.

Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions on Horizon 2020 - The Framework Programme for Research and Innovation

Euro-India SPIRIT Recommendations– The New Digital Paradigm: Harnessing EU-India ICT Research Cooperation

Wed, 07 Dec 2011 12:31:00 GMT

At a time when Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) are evolving at an unprecedented rate, Euro-India SPIRIT has endeavoured to establish a dialogue between stakeholders from two key global markets, the European Union (EU) and the Republic of India.
Our aim has been to formulate a mutually beneficial research agenda that could subsequently be taken up through specific bilateral initiatives. Euro-India SPIRIT builds on successful cooperation initiatives funded by the European Commission’s 7th Framework Programme for Research and Technology Development (FP7) aimed at forging links between the EU and India. To this end, the project has focused on connecting European and Indian stakeholders from enterprise, government, academia and research to promote the strategic advantages of cooperation in areas of mutual interest while working towards mitigating cultural differences and overcoming institutional barriers.
Our recommendations have been built through close interaction with eighteen renowned ICT experts with an equal balance between Europeans and Indians. Engagement over a two-year period has helped identify key priority areas for collaborative research, defining the scope of the recommendations for each key area presented here.
The recommendations aim to lay the foundations for future ICT research collaboration between the European Union and India as we approach the EC’s next Common Strategy Framework (CSF), Horizon 2020 to be launched in 2013 and based upon the success of FP7, the Competitiveness and Innovation Framework Programme (CIP) and theEuropean Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT).
Underlying these funding streams is the Digital Agenda for Europe (DAE), a major roadmap defining the key roles that the use of ICT will have to play for Europe to succeed in its ambitions for a flourishing digital economy by 2020. The DAE is inextricably bound up with the areas of ICT research that have been assessed by Euro-India SPIRIT and that are of relevance to both the EU and India. EU-India Cooperation must harness the game-changing potential of ICT research and development to tackle grand challenges facing both Europe and India with particular reference to inclusive, innovative and secure societies.