2 Methodology and Tools

seamless exchange of information between suppliers, subcontractors and consumers. Finally, on the level of innovation itself there is, together with the development of suitable policies, a need for both producers and consumers to address sustainability requirements for the products they are manufacturing and using. Therefore the vertical experiment on eManufacturing clustered three Living Labs within the automotive sector in three different countries. Through the application of an Integration and Service platform that can act as a collaborative platform, this experiment wanted to assess how and to what extent such a platform, through which new services can be developed and evaluated, can address the challenges mentioned above.

The eParticipation and Social Media experiment focused on user empowerment, which have always been an important objective for governments. The rise of so-called Web2.0 applications and services has contributed to this objective by significantly lowering the thresholds for users. Also, new types of technologies like 3D media and RFID offer complementary opportunities for citizens to participate in various kinds of (community) activities. But often such eParticipation applications and services are developed for and within a specific, local context. Promoting citizens’ participation to innovative eMedia services on a European scale and at the early phases of the designing process can help existing projects to reach a European audience. But such an approach is challenged by issues concerning interoperability, regulation and contextualization, which need to be addressed. Therefore the objective of the eParticipation and Social Media vertical experiment was to develop a framework, addressing these challenges for integrating different independent Living Lab experiments. The eParticipation and Social Media vertical experiment clustered three running local Living Lab projects in three countries, in which social media are being used to stimulate and facilitate the participation of citizens. The experiment focused on interworking and integration of the fragmented solutions being piloted across Europe. Therefore, the experiment assessed to what extent an integration framework dealing with the issues of interoperability, regulation and contextualization can facilitate cross-border research between different stakeholders as well as to what extent this approach can be used to scale-up existing projects and to explore new markets.

The first result of the APOLLON vertical and horizontal activities is a set of methods, tools and guidelines enabling sustainable collaboration for research, development, innovation and market development in settings of cross-border living lab networks, including: • Guidelines, methods and tools for collaboration among the partners of a cross border living labs network, addressing the different challenges covered in the domain specific pilot experiments. • A platform for methodology support, offered through the “Knowledge Centre” (http://knowledgecenter.openlivinglabs.eu/). This portal contains a repository of recommended tools, guidelines and practices. We have ensured that this will be continued after the lifetime of APOLLON, through collaboration with the European Network of Living Labs (ENoLL) and the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT) Knowledge and Innovation Communities (KIC).

The specific cross border aspects of setting up, operating and managing living labs networks and cross border aspects of innovation and market creation arise because of the existence of differences, i.e.: • Differences in cultures and practices of human and organizational collaboration, and related aspects of decision making, design traditions etc. which affects processes of collaborative innovation and market creation, and collaboration in general, and requires

efforts to enhance trust and understanding, create common organizational approaches and common visions. • Differences in business ecosystems or value networks: different actor roles, responsibilities, organizations, which requires finding appropriate partners and ensuring that roles and responsibilities are met. • Different local and national rules and regulations, e.g. the existence of different regulatory and competition frameworks in healthcare and energy sectors across countries, or different frameworks for IPR and contracting, which requires the modification or adaptation of these frameworks. • Differences in technical systems, requiring interoperability, standards and local adaptation of systems to user environments. The existence of these differences encourages us to think more fundamentally about methods and guidelines to overcome such differences. As the table below illustrates, these methods and guidelines can be of a very different nature.

Cross border issues Overcoming cross-border issues to connect and interoperate in cross border living labs networks Different cultures and practices of humans and organizations This is relevant where different living labs are working together for example on joint development and testing. Here we need to address the behavior and understanding between people and the alignment of work processes and project management. Different business ecosystems and value networks This is relevant where living labs work together and also where technologies are transferred into another market. Success conditions of adopting technology solutions must be understood and besides technical adaptations, in new markets the roles and responsibilities of actors should be fulfilled. Different regulatory systems and rules Such different regulatory systems may hinder the transfer of technology solutions to another market. Technology solutions must be adapted and be adaptable to the local market conditions. Different technical systems and infrastructure Different applications and platforms may need to interoperate to enable seamless collaboration across boundaries. Technologies, systems or services may need specific adaptations and interfaces to be useful in another market. Differences in cross-border environments and how to overcome them

A first element to be highlighted in the APOLLON methodology is working with scenarios for cross-border Living Lab projects. Within APOLLON, scenarios are not considered in the usual way of describing a possible, often extreme, future situation under uncertainty, for the purpose of stretching our minds to generate new solutions. Rather, APOLLON scenarios represent high-level storyline description of the actions, situations and processes that together constitute the creation of the cross-border living lab and its networking and collaboration in action. Elaborating the scenario has the role to clarify the methodology requirements. The figure below provides the initial APOLLON scenario at the level of “actions”. This scenario illustrates a storyline sequence of actions including business opportunity identification, contacting living labs, matchmaking with cross-border living labs, project scoping, stakeholder identification and agreement finding, project management, market introduction analysis, and evaluation.

Initial cross-border living lab scenario

This basic scenario has adapted and more elaborated versions for each of the four pilot environments. We have used a visualization tool (Windows Office Visio) as a graphical tool to develop scenarios. This can be of use in the development stage of pilots and in the methodology development process itself, as the figure below demonstrate.

Graphical representation of a scenario

More detailed graphical representation of a scenario

Secondly, there is the methodology framework developed within APOLLON. We distinguish different purposes of these methods, tools and guidelines, that each have been developed, gathered, described systematically and validated in the pilots: 1. Support the creation phase (preparation, setting up, planning) of the cross-border network. The creation includes preparation and planning of the living labs network until it can be launched. The APOLLON methods are Business plan for a cross border living labs network, Cross border living lab network development plan, Detailed cross border living lab network planning, Business opportunity identification and analysis, Partner search and selection, Business model design for cross border networks, IP based business models for open living labs networks, Consortium contract agreement for collaboration in a living labs network, Profiling of living labs and SMEs for finding partners, IPR handling and knowledge base, and Cross-Border Living Lab Partner Contracting. 2. Support the general operation of the cross border living lab network, when this network is set in place. Methods and tools are required that will support the research, development, innovation and market creation activities within the network. APOLLON has covered: General framework for conducting RDI in cross border settings, Management of a network of cross border living labs, Project plan development for a cross-border living lab network, Planning of innovation projects within a cross border living lab network, Project management tools and guidelines, Collaboration tools in cross border living labs networks, and Performance analysis of a living labs network using KPIs. 3. Resolve interoperability challenges specific for pilot contexts. Within APOLLON these challenges address the use of common elements across the cross-border network. These common elements include 1. ecosystems, 2. data benchmarks, 3. platforms, 3. service frameworks. Pilot contexts differ in terms of e.g. stakeholders, their objectives, the actual innovation. APOLLON distinguishes four pilots characterized by four distinct challenges

to be addressed within a pilot. These are: Common ecosystems: facilitating transfer of technologies; Common benchmarking of data facilitating adoption of technology solutions; Common technology platform to facilitate collaboration for service innovation; and Common integration framework to enable user participation in service innovation. 4. Resolve specific problems or issues. Besides the key challenges, many specific issues are to be addressed that require specific method, tools and solutions or practices. APOLLON has systematically covered: User interface translation, Value network analysis, User data benchmarking model, Investigating user behavior transformation, Test storylines for user communication, Knowledge transfer across pilots, Policy and regulations database, Remote guided living labs tour by using webcam, Trading platform for DMI agents, Software license agreement, Living lab contracting frameworks, Community reporting tool, Data protection template, and Sub-license agreement. 5. Address overarching issues in cross border networking of living labs. Here we have pointed to the general, “foundational” theories and methodologies that are useful to guide the strategy for creation of living labs networks for open and user driven innovation, more specifically: Research framework for designing and evaluating living labs networks, Action research framework for implementation of the living lab network, Cross border living lab network pilot development and execution, Socio-technical change, actor network theory and related frameworks, Living lab methodologies for open and user driven innovation, and Creating and operating virtual organizations. The methods, tools and guidelines also include collaboration guidelines, of interest for actors and organizations. Because this is a “horizontal” issue this is not reflected in one specific category but included in the categories defined above. Still, the aspect of collaboration merits specific attention.

One important aspect related to the guidelines, methods and tools is that they have been implemented, validated, and refined in a continuous iterative process between the ‘horizontal’ methodology WP and the ‘vertical’ pilot WPs. The pilots in the various thematic domains conducted their experiments following the same high-level schedule (depicted below) but with very different emphasis and contexts. Therefore, already in the initial phases of the project it became apparent that there was need for harmonization and methodological support for the experiments. The application of the common Research Framework as proposed by the Methodology WP has assisted the pilots in structuring their activities in the experiments and putting them into a process oriented frame. This also has assisted communications with the various partners in various experiments and locations, and in turn allowed the project to collect validation data in pre-defined categories. The common Research Framework was developed also in order to establish a common language and terminology for the project as a whole.

Steps within the APOLLON thematic experiments

APOLLON implemented an iterative process for all of this between the methodology WP (WP1) and the vertical WPs, whereby WP1 representatives acted as “liaisons” to support the

four pilot experiments in applying the methodology framework and supporting them in the various stages of the pilot experiments. This is depicted in the figure below.

Interaction between liaisons & experiments (WPx)

From the results of the validation process conducted by WP 1 throughout the course of APOLLON and its four pilots, the initially proposed APOLLON Methodology Framework was updated, refined and confirmed. This methodology consisted of three main pillars: 1. The four phases, 2. The Scenario approach, 3. The Research framework. So, to summarise:

..the 4-phases, that describe a Living Lab managing domain networks from the set-up, over the execution to its vision/purpose …

… the scenario approach, that helps guiding the collaboration for an experiment along a storyboard, embracing all stakeholders and –after having followed it once –acts as a best practice for the next project …

… the Research Framework, that enforces deeply thinking about the objectives of your research or your project; by applying it on a regular base either helps you correct the project or adapt/extend your objectives …..

… and in addition, the ‘vertically’ identified challenges, which are socio-economic challenges…

… can be added to the validated methods and tools, following the structuring from more general to more specific,….

… and thus the final APOLLON Methodology Framework can be visualized as follows.