EU - Japan Joint Call

Specific Challenge:

Following the integration and federation of IoT with Big Data and Cloud, which has been explored in past coordinated calls, a remaining challenge to address is enhanced security and privacy and how the human user deals with the ever-increasing amount of sensors, smart objects and data. Both EU and Japan have excellent competences in the fields of cybersecurity systems and visualisation technologies. Especially, security aspects are of increasing importance in these years. There is a need for simple, efficient and trustable systems based on advanced technologies combining Security, Cloud and IoT/Big Data technologies that can provide intelligent detection and countermeasures for device malware attacks, automatic vulnerability discovery and patching, analytics and IoT/Big Data applications. All of these require advanced cloud and edge computing technologies and interoperable IoT devices and platforms.

These new requirements, including security aspects, will have an enormous impact on the underlying cloud/IoT platforms and associated services, especially for cross-border demonstrations of technologies and applications.

Furthermore, interoperability of IoT devices/platforms is of particular interest in the context of Smart Cities (the areas of energy, social infrastructure, traffic/transport, healthcare, and disaster/crime prevention) in order to promote collaboration between a variety of business operators and platforms connecting to various IoT devices, open source, standards, SDKs, common APIs, are the cornerstone of the EU-Japan collaboration.

Scope:

The proposals should address one of the two following areas:

1) Advanced technologies combining Security, IoT, Cloud and Big data for a hyper-connected society

The focus is to research, develop and test advanced technologies combining Security, IoT, Cloud and Big data. The following technologies are expected for research and development: agility against emerging threats; automatic vulnerability discovery and patching; open-sourcing of security tools; IoT security; cloud security; data security; privacy protection; data anonymization; blockchain in the context of IoT/Cloud; critical information infrastructure protection, cross border application demonstrations; etc.

2) Interoperable technologies of IoT devices/platforms in the context of Smart Cities

The focus is to research, develop and test interoperable technologies of IoT devices/platforms in the context of Smart Cities. The following technologies are expected for research and development: edge/fog/cloud computing; low power; scalability; open-standards-based platforms; system and reference architectures; open application programming interfaces (API); data sharing among cross-market/cultural platforms; managing distributed data among different communities and regions; bridging different standardizations; technical verification; cross border application demonstrations; energy management; transportation systems; maintenance systems for life infrastructure; etc. A further objective is to contribute to standardization activities under the cooperation of EU-JP research institutes and IoT-related consortia (e.g. the Alliance for IoT Innovation (AIOTI) and IoT Acceleration Consortium), and promote a global expansion of research results in Smart Cities.

The Commission considers that proposals requesting a contribution from the EU up to EUR 1.5 million would allow this specific challenge to be addressed appropriately by one project of EUR 1.5 million in each of the suggested areas. Nonetheless, this does not preclude submission and selection of proposals requesting other amounts.

Expected Impact:

• Credible demonstrations based on cross-border business and/or societal applications of robust interoperable technologies identifying policy/legal obstacles (i.e., free flow of data, data protection, data portability etc.).
• Concrete implementations of interoperable solutions that integrate IoT, Cloud and Big Data including security that are candidates for standardisation.
• Facilitation of the development of cloud-enabled, secure and trustworthy IoT/big data applications (i.e., integrating intelligent security systems and visualisation technologies and devices/interfaces).
• Promotion of the use of data related to Smart Cities and the creation of new increasingly efficient services in urban and regional administrative management.
• Joint contributions to standardization activities under the cooperation of EU-Japan research institutes and IoT-related consortia (e.g. AIOTI and IoT Acceleration Consortium).