China – Finland Strategic ICT Alliance

Shanghai

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Developing industry – University cooperation in China: Demola and DIMECC meeting at Fudan Nordic Center

Nov 30 2016

November 2016, Shanghai

Developing industry – University cooperation in China: Demola and DIMECC meeting at Fudan Nordic Center

Nordic Design and Innovation Week 2015 in Shanghai

Nov 03 2015

FinCEAL Plus in cooperation with China-Finland Strategic ICT Alliance organize this high-level seminar in the context of the Nordic Design and Innovation Week, NDIW2015. The seminar is aligned with the CleanConnect Congress in Shanghai for Chinese and global cleantech companies and institutes to meet potential investors and customers. This seminar and affiliated meetings are targeted to universities, research institutes, companies, public sector experts and decisions makers at cities and government agencies working on cleantech, environment and related urban design issues. The aim is to provide opportunities for researchers and business and public sector representatives to get into detailed discussions on further cooperation.

Seminar program can be downloaded from here:

NDIW2015 program 78.84 KB

Download NDIW2015 seminar program

Seminar speaker biography can be downloaded from here:

NDIW2015 Speaker Biography 914.11 KB

Download NDIW2015 Speaker Biography

China – Finland Strategic ICT Alliance International Workshop Week 21 – 24 April 2015 will be held in Shanghai

May 02 2015

China-Finland ICT Alliance: Newsletter: January-March 2014

Apr 16 2014

China-Finland ICT Alliance: Newsletter: January-March 2014 435.43 KB

Click to download China -Finland ICT Alliance January - March 2014 Update.pdf

China-Finland ICT Alliance Finnish Partners Workshop

A workshop with the Finnish partners of China-Finland ICT Alliance was held in Espoo on 11 February 2014. The key target was to share current accomplishments of each project, and plan cooperation activities and actions in 2014. In addition to the Phase II project representatives, also invited experts from universities, companies and funding organisations were attending the workshop to discuss new activities in 5G and future networks and other areas such as sensing, traffic and geoservices. The workshop had two specific parallel sessions on future networking with 5G, and intelligent sensing and services in urban environment including traffic and mobility.

Dr. Matti Hämäläinen with Dr. Jani Kaarlejärvi presented an update on the China-Finland ICT Alliance progress and the plans for 2014. This update was elaborated in working sessions on two specific topics: 5G and sensing / traffic applications. Also, information on China-related Tekes activities in ICT and applications was provided, including preliminary information on the forthcoming MOST-Tekes call (opening in March and closing in the end of April 2014) and related cooperation with Jiangsu and Zhejiang provinces. This call aims at industrial partners, and SMEs in particular, with the overall theme of cleantech and its applications. In the ICT Alliance context, air quality monitoring solutions and traffic solutions seem potential candidate areas. These themes also contribute to the Tekes coordinated Beautiful Beijing cooperation framework during 2014.

The Phase II Alliance projects form new thematic groups. The two closely related networking projects, Energy-Efficient Wireless Networks and Connectivity of Devices -Densification & Energy-Efficient Wireless Networks and Connectivity of Devices – Systems, were presented by Dr. Alexis Dowhuszko, Aalto University and by Prof. Mikko Valkama, Tampere University of Technology. The academic partners include Aalto University, Tampere University of Technology, University of Oulu, VTT, Shanghai Research Center for Wireless Communications (WICO), Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications (BUPT), Southeast University (SEU), University of Electronic Science and Technology (UESTC), Huazhong University of Science and Technology (HUST), University of Science and Technology of China (USTC), and Harbin Institute of Technology (HIT).

The two projects focusing of sensing and intelligent services with applications in traffic and urban mobility form another thematic project group. Everyday Sensing was presented by Dr. Mika Rautiainen, University of Oulu.

It includes University of Oulu, Aalto University, University of Helsinki, Shanghai Jiaotong University, Tsinghua University, Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications (BUPT), and Huazhong University of Science and Technology as its academic partners. Sensing City Traffic was presented by Dr. Timo Nyberg, Aalto University. The academic partners include Aalto University and Chinese Academy of Sciences. These projects intensify research cooperation among each other and with related projects in Finland and China as described in the Research Forum Working group section below.

The project focusing on navigation systems cooperation, Finland’s Enhanced Navigation using COMPASS/Beidou Signals, was presented by Dr. Laura Ruotsalainen, Finnish Geodetic Institute (FGI). Finnish Geodetic Institute (FGI), GNSS Research Center (GRC) in Wuhan University, and Chinese Antarctic Center of Surveying and Mapping (CACSM) are the research partners. There is an interest both sides in China and Finland to extend this cooperation to include new research partners and companies (e.g. with Geostar who also joined the workshop).

Related to future activity planning, presentations were also given by invited experts: Dr. Sergey Andreev with Prof. Evgeny Kucheryavy, Tampere University of Technology, presented their research on Improved Connectivity and Service Experience in Heterogeneous 5G Deployments; and Future Networking cooperation (Beyond Internet) was represented by Dr. Arto Karila and Dr. Dmitrji Lagutin, who have been carrying on cooperation with Future Network Innovation Institute of China (FNII) based in Nanjing.

In the working session Prof. Jyrki Nummenmaa, University of Tampere, introduced their research activities in intelligent traffic (related to the City of Tampere’s Intelligent Traffic activities) and cooperation links in China.

An update on eServices and eBusiness research and the eBEREA network activities was presented by Prof. Jukka Heikkilä, University of Turku. Currently, active areas include research on developing and implementing digital services for “young elderly” in the BeWell research activity. It is now a part of DIGILE’s D2I research programme and has several company and research partners in Finland and is closely linked with international partners in China, Germany, Italy, Sweden and The Netherlands.

Dr. Risto Vilkko, Academy of Finland, presented the cooperation framework between the Academy of Finland and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC) and the process for the ongoing preparation of a joint call on 5G networks. Dr. Mika Klemettinen, Tekes, described Tekes’ activities and future directions in the networking and Internet of Things areas that are thematically related to the ongoing and new initiatives in ICT Alliance. Companies in the field of future networks, everyday sensing and social media, and geoservices were presented by Dr. Philip Ginzboorg, Huawei, Mr. Kimmo Valtonen, M-Brain and Mr. Tony Liu, Geostar (WudaGeo).

In 2014, China-Finland cooperation develops even faster to a cross-industrial dimension that is closely linked with, for example, establishment of business ecosystems, establishment of research forums, utilisation of R&D&I opportunities under Horizon 2020, as well as planning of an international ICT Alliance workshop. The effort continues in the development of ICT Alliance as an open “platform” for international R&D&I cooperation. While there are several areas where Chinese partners, universities, research centers and companies, have indicated their concrete interest in cooperating with Finnish partners, financing international R&D&I cooperation still remains a challenge. This is particularly true when considering public funding for university research but similar challenges also appear when companies search for financing for cooperation in new areas.

In this situation it becomes even more important to be able to link complementary activities and resources as well as different modes of operation together (e.g. cooperation in research projects, education and business pilots). The project based work may be considered as the “backbone” of ICT Alliance and it is worthwhile to consider how next projects can be built on current cooperation and results – and how new partners already working with China or interested in joining may be brought into cooperation in the areas of joint interest. It would be an asset to receive ideas and input on such initiatives in which China-Finland R&D&I cooperation in ICT and digital services could have role. This would allow ICT Alliance, well in advance, to contact relevant Finnish and Chinese experts and institutions who may contribute to joint activities – and also benefit from participation. Also, this would allow ICT Alliance to synchronise ICT Alliance with other relevant Finland-China actions and activities.

China-Finland Workshop on 5G Networks in Shanghai

China-Finland Workshop on 5G Networks was organised by Shanghai Research Center for Wireless Communications (WICO), supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China and Academy of Finland, and in cooperation with China-Finland ICT Alliance. About 30 key Finnish and Chinese future network experts were invited to the workshop that was held in Shanghai on 10-12 March 2014. Keynote addresses were given by Prof. Yang Yang, Director, Shanghai Research Center for Wireless Communications (WICO), Mr. Zhaotian Zhang, Deputy Director General, Department of Information Sciences, National Natural Science Foundation of China and Dr. Risto Vilkko, Programme Manager, Academy of Finland.

The objectives of the workshop were to discuss current developments in future network research, identify joint research interests in the field of 5G and finalise the collaborative Finland-China research project agenda. Considering the long term track record in Finland on cellular network development starting from General System for Mobile Communications (GSM), and the urgent demand for advanced mobile technologies in China, it is beneficial and strategic important to carry on joint 5G research in areas such as system design; air interface and multi-antenna; new spectrum, millimetre wave air interface and backhaul; efficient hardware and platforms, multi-cell, and signal processing; as well as management and modelling.

From the Chinese side, technical presentations were given by Prof. Xiaohu Ge, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Prof. Jianhua Zhang, Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications, Prof. Honglin Hu, Shanghai Institute of Microsystem and Information Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Prof. Qinyu Zhang, Harbin Institute of Technology, Dr. Fusheng Zhe, ZTE Corporation, Prof. Hua Zhang, Southeast University, Prof. Pinyi Ren, Xi’an Jiaotong University, Prof. Shengjie Zhao, Tongji University, Prof. Zhisheng Niu, Tsinghua University, Prof. Gang Wu, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Prof. Wuyang Zhou, University of Science and Technology of China, and Prof. Lingyang Song, Peking University.

From the Finnish side, presentations were given by Prof. Evgeny Kucheryavy, Tampere University of Technology, Prof. Mikko Valkama Tampere University of Technology, Dr. Sergey Andreev, Tampere University of Technology, Prof. Sasu Tarkoma, University of Helsinki, Dr. Tao Chen, VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland, Prof. Antti-Heikki Tölli, University of Oulu, Prof. Riku Jäntti, Aalto University, and Dr. Kari Pehkonen, Broadcom Communications Finland Ltd. On behalf of China-Finland ICT Alliance, Dr. Jani Kaarlejärvi talked about the 5G elements of Horizon 2020, and financial opportunities in setting up joint, large-scale Finland-China-EU projects in the field of 5G. To begin a joint 5G EU proposal planning raised a lot of interest, and one or two joint teams could be set up to begin the planning for Call 14.

After three days of actively elaborating of the content of the joint call for Chinese-Finnish scientific cooperation, National Natural Science Foundation of China and Academy of Finland signed the Memorandum of Understanding concerning joint call on 5G networks. According to the preliminary schedule, the joint call will be published and opened in June 2014, decisions will be made in October 2014 and the funding period would begin in early 2015.

China-focused EduTech Business Ecosystem Workshop

Education is a focal area in China-Finland cooperation and to better synchronise activities and boost the impact of cooperation, the ”Sino–Finnish Learning Factory” (SFLF) initiative has been prepared under the direction of the Finnish Ministry of Education and Culture together with a team of experts from companies, research institutions and organisations. The initial areas suggested for the SFLF initiative include: learning research, teacher training and learning solutions, i.e. technology, services, and content ranging from kindergarten to primary, secondary and higher education and to vocational and professional education. When preparing the SFLF initiative, Digile as the Coordinator of China-Finland ICT Alliance has been invited to facilitate the cooperation of education technology and services companies, including related piloting and research. The preparation of EduTech business ecosystem started by Digile in 2013 together with those companies that were interested in education technologies and services area, under a theme “Education-as-a-Service”.

In addition to the development of the EduTech business ecosystem, education is also an active area in Digile’s Digital Services research programme and a candidate service area for the recently launched FORGE Service Laboratory. Collaboration is the best way to achieve successful global EduTech business, especially for Finnish players that can jointly better address the market needs by providing complementary and scalable offerings as many of the new innovative companies tend to be rather small. EduTech business ecosystem workshops were organised at Digile on 11 March 2014 and 1 April 2014. The ambition was to involve and activate such education and learning technology companies that have interest in international markets and China in particular. The goal of the EduTech business ecosystem is nothing less than jointly providing disruptive new products into the global market, starting with China and working together with leading Chinese partners.

As ecosystem programmes are about seeking market validation for joint business cases, Workshop I focused on going through company business needs and expectation, identifying potential collaborators and initial pilot ideas. Based on the results of Workshop I and discussions between prospective partners between the workshops, Workshop II targeted a collaborative programme framework and goal setting, creating a list of potential pilots with value proposition and customer and partners involved, as well as in the end agreeing on next steps to create a programme framework presentation to the Digile Board of Directors.

Workshop I companies cover several relevant target groups and potential pilots in China. Mr. Niko Lindholm, TribaLearning, together with Dr. Mika Seppälä, WEPS, and Mr. Antti Korhonen, Leia Media, are working on a business pilot involving learning analytics and ultra-low energy delivery platform (”e-paper” by Leia Media stemming from earlier China-Finland research cooperation). In China, interested partners include university education technology centers with pilot schools as well as educational publishers. Mr. Sotiris Makrygiannis, Eliademy (CBTech), described how their user population and channel would contribute to a pilot.

The second pilot was outlined by Mr. Ari Ketola, Context Learning Finland, Mr. Pentti Mero, Airport College, and Mr. Esa Tervo, Neoxen. It focuses on professional and corporate training, on transport and logistics in particular, targeting e.g. airport professional training. Mr. Mika Martikainen, Skilltize, described their offering in real-time online training and tutoring, with an initial focus on languages (English and other) and mathematics. Synergies were identified among these two pilots in planning and potential for a few additional pilots to be specified during the planning process. It has also become obvious that there is an interest among the partners to involve research centers in the EduTech cooperation model. A Research forum for education technologies and services focus area within ICT Alliance is now in active planning.

Focus area: Intelligent Sensing and Services for Traffic and Mobility in Urban Environment

In ICT Alliance, intelligent sensing, social media and data analysis are being studied in projects, “Everyday Sensing” and “Sensing City Traffic”, whose target application areas are traffic and urban mobility services. Similar China-Finland focused projects are under planning in the University of Tampere and Aalto University. Intelligent traffic and mobility solutions for the urban environment are a promising area for the cooperation based on complementary expertise, approaches and capabilities. The combination of rapidly developing sensing capabilities, ubiquitous wireless networks, crowdsourcing, social media (analysis), dynamic routing and related technologies provide opportunities for creating new and innovative solutions and new businesses.

These new solutions will also substantially help in addressing serious environmental challenges in cities. Better flow of traffic and improved understanding of people’s daily travel chains makes it possible to develop more energy efficient transportation solutions. To better leverage the synergies among these projects, to improve sharing and co-developing methods and tools, to enable sharing of data, results and experiences from technology and business pilots, ICT Alliance has been preparing to launch a “Research Forum on Intelligent Sensing and Services in Urban Environment for Traffic and Mobility” (ISSUE-TM) during spring 2014. The experiences from this first ICT Alliance Research Forum will be analysed and utilised when considering setting up next Research Forums in other areas of joint interest, such as education technology and services, elderly services and smart home, and geoservices.

Focus area: Elderly Services and Smart Home

In the ICT Alliance context, there has been an interest among a group of universities and companies to develop cooperation that would more actively link the areas of elderly services, personal health and wellbeing and smart home together. A “Home-as-a-Service Platform” concept has been introduced by Digile as a potential framework to bring together related activities in these complimentary areas. For example, a “Home based personal services for elderly” concept is being developed by Active Life Village and its partners in close cooperation with cities, such as the City of Espoo.

Elderly services and smart home solutions will be discussed in Beijing in early May 2014 in an international cooperation meeting hosted by the Beijing Academy of Science and Technology (BJAST), a key ICT Alliance partner in this area, involving also Fraunhofer IAO and representatives from Taiwan and Korea. Dr. Matti Hämäläinen, as the ICT Alliance representative, will also join the “3rd China International Senior Services Expo” (CISSE 2014) that is the main event in this field. This trip will also include visits to Zhongguancun Z-Park and Life Science Park for extending cooperation in these areas (these events coincide with the planned visit of Minister for Social Affairs and Health, Paula Risikko, in Beijing at the same time).

Hanasaari Forum on Nordic Education, Exporting Education Knowhow and China Cooperation

Hanasaari, the Swedish-Finnish Culture Centre, organised a Nordic forum on education and learning exporting on 31 March that gathered experts from Finland and Sweden to boost joint actions. Key discussion topics focused on ways how to increase education internationalisation, how to attract more international students to Nordic countries and how to take advantage of Nordic competitiveness in education and the Nordic education brand. The keynote addresses were given by Dr. Anders Ahlstrand, Senior Policy Advisor, Swedish Council for Higher Education and Dr. Päivi Lipponen, Member of Finnish Parliament and Chairperson of the Government’s Committee for Education Exports.

China-Finland R&D&I cooperation for scaling education technology and services business was presented by Dr. Matti Hämäläinen, Coordinator of China-Finland ICT Alliance, Digile. He illustrated the need of digital learning solutions and the opportunities in combining key strengths in Finland and in China for co-creating breakthroughs in the area. As a concrete example, he described EduTech business ecosystem that is currently being set up by Digile in the context of the Sino-Finnish Learning Factory (SFLF) initiative of the Ministry of Education and Culture. EduTech Ecosystem focuses on business pilots in China as well as co-creating scalable solutions to larger market areas. The target market areas cover the whole spectrum ranging from kindergarten to university and professional/enterprise education.

Focus area: Environmental Monitoring (Air Quality)

Together with a leading Chinese geoservice company Geostar (Wuda-Geo) and a number of Finnish air quality monitoring and modelling companies, ICT Alliance initiated in March 2014 the planning of a China-Finland proposal for an “Air Quality Monitoring Platform”. There is already an established map based monitoring platform developed by Geostar to be used as a basis solution in China. For synchronising cross-sectoral China-Finland cooperation, a meeting on business and R&D opportunities for monitoring and improving outdoor and indoor air quality in China was hosted by Cleen, involving VTT, Rym, Digile/China-Finland ICT Alliance, and others.

Pure Finland 2014 – High-level Events in Beijing in Autumn 2014

Pure Finland is the main activity of the Finnish Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the whole Team Finland in China in 2014, and ICT Alliance is a member of the planning working group. In addition, ICT Alliance will organise a China-Finland business and technology cooperation related event as a part of the autumn’s activities. Pure Finland is a project with a long-term view to strengthen the country brand of Finland, including Finnish businesses in China and particularly in Beijing. The aim to make an impact among key Chinese government, business, education and science, culture, media and tourism organisations, as well as consumers with a high purchasing power, through a series of events in Beijing in autumn 2014. Expected benefits are, such as, visibility in tens of Chinese major newspapers, magazines and TV with millions of readers or audience; interaction with tens of thousands of young Chinese through the Chinese social media; direct contact with key Chinese partners, interest groups and/or customers and thus strengthened relations; and extended cooperation network with other Finnish organisations for future projects in China. According to the current schedule, the events in Beijing will focus on:

“Coolest brands from Finland”, September;
“Destination Finland”, 23-25 October;
“Innovation Finland”, 25-27 November; and
“Creative Finland”, December.

Jani Kaarlejärvi Appointed an Advisory Board Member in the European Commission funded CHOICE project on EU-China cooperation on ICT R&D&I

European and Chinese organisations gathered in Chengdu on January 10, 2014 to officially launch the CHOICE project, funded by the European Commission DG CONNECT. The project aims to provide continuity and progress in supporting and strengthening Europe-China Collaboration on ICT research, offering timely input on common ICT R&D priorities and future cooperation opportunities. It builds on and goes beyond the results of previous project, the OpenChina-ICT project in particular. The CHOICE consortium is a balance of Chinese and European partners, incl. OpenChina-ICT project partners (SIGMA and CATR), as well as China ACCESS4EU (SPI, TORCH, EUPIC) and DRAGON-STAR (SPI) partners, which guarantees that all the valuable outputs of previous projects will be fully exploited and that synergies with relevant projects will be developed.

Through its objectives, the CHOICE project creates a bridge towards Horizon 2020 to shift away from technology-driven towards innovation-driven ICT R&D based on societal and consumer needs:

• Identify obstacles to reciprocity and encouraging a more balanced ICT R&D&I relationship with China based on reciprocity, supporting European nationals, companies and organisations willing to access Chinese research programmes;

• Highlight and showcase European and Chinese excellence in ICT R&D; and

• Strengthen EU-China industrial ICT R&D cooperation, also with the view of preparing the ground for new upcoming rules governing EU-China ICT R&D cooperation under Horizon 2020.

Jani Kaarlejärvi was appointed an Advisory Board Member in the CHOICE project. The advisory board members help the project to liaise with other European and bilateral projects ensuring continuous communication between CHOICE and other key initiatives. The main role of its members is to contribute to the updating and fine tuning of the “Roadmap towards enhanced EU-China ICT R&D cooperation”, identifying and detailing cooperation priorities between the EU and China in the ICT field and providing recommendations. CHOICE Advisory Board meetings take place in conjunction with project events and workshops and CHOICE Advisory Board members meet in person at least twice over the duration of the project, while additional virtual meetings will be organised on an ad hoc basis.

Next Activities and Actions

China-Finland ICT Alliance new initiative meetings in Shanghai, Beijing and Wuhan, 7-17 April
Cooperation meetings on Elderly Care Services and “Smart Home for elderly”, 3-9 May, Beijing
China-Finland ICT Alliance new initiative meetings in Shanghai and Beijing, June
ICT Alliance Research Forum on Intelligent Sensing and Services in Urban Environment for Traffic and Mobility (ISSUE-TM) during the 10th ITS European Congress, 16-19 June, Helsinki
International Conference on Management Science and Engineering (21th) (ICMSE2014) in cooperation with eBEREA network, 17-18 August, Helsinki
Finnish-Chinese Workshop on Analysis of Social Media, University of Tampere, 6-13 August, Tampere
Pure Finland, “Coolest brands from Finland”, September, Beijing
Shanghai Design Week, 13.-17.10.2014, Shanghai
Radical Design Week, 16.-25.10.2014, Shanghai
Pure Finland, “Destination Finland”, 23-25 October, Beijing
Pure Finland, “Innovation Finland”, 25-27 November, Beijing
Pure Finland, “Creative Finland”, December, Beijing

More Information on China-Finland ICT Alliance and Digile

For more information, please visit the China-Finland ICT Alliance website www.ictalliance.org, Digile website www.digile.fi and http://www.digile.fi/DIGILEintro or contact Dr. Matti Hämäläinen and Dr. Jani Kaarlejärvi (firstname.lastname@digile.fi).

Minister of Communications Ms. Pia Viitanen visits China

Nov 10 2013

Minister of Communications Ms. Pia Viitanen visits China

Minister of Communications Ms. Pia Viitanen visits China on 10-17 November 2013 with a business delegation in which Mr. Reijo Paajanen, CEO, DIGILE Ltd., also participates.

The themes of the visit cover areas that are of joint interest for both Finland and China. These include, among others, smart cities and sustainable urban design as well as telecommunication, digital broadcast, digital services and business as enabled by the Internet and new technologies.

Working together with Team Finland, and Finpro in particular, China-Finland ICT Alliance coordinated by DIGILE (Dr. Matti Hämäläinen) and Shanghai Research Center for Wireless Communications WiCo (Dr. Yang Yang) has planned a Business Networking Event titled “Co-creating Future Digital Business: Communication and Media Focus” for the delegation in Shanghai on 13 November.

The aim is to share few concise “snapshots” on recent business and R&D&I developments in Finland and China highlighting some key areas represented by the delegation members. Following Minister Viitanen’s opening remarks, Ms. Sirpa Ojala, CEO, Digita Networks Ltd., Head of the Business Delegation, and Mr. Reijo Paajanen will present the views from Finland. Mr. Andy Huang, VP, BesTV of SMG and a long term partner Mr. Simon Wang, VP, NERC-DTV will present updated views from China, before moving to a networking session where both business opportunities as well as joint research opportunities in the China-Finland ICT Alliance framework will be discussed.

The one week visit to China will also include several meetings on ICT, R&D&I cooperation and SME engagement that are expected to have a positive impact on the development of China-Finland ICT and digital services cooperation and also to open up new international cooperation opportunities.

Boosting China Cooperation

Nov 08 2013

China-Finland ICT Alliance October 2013 Update

China-Finland ICT Alliance October 2013 Update 402.22 KB

Click to download China -Finland ICT Alliance October 2013 Update.pdf

Finland as “Country of Honour for 2013” in Pujiang Innovation Forum in Shanghai

Finland was nominated by the Ministry of Science and Technology of China (MOST) as the “Country of Honour for 2013” for Pujiang Innovation Forum 26-27 October 2013 in Shanghai. Pujiang Innovation Forum has been established in 2008 to highlight best practices in international innovation cooperation and to exchange views, knowledge and visions between industrial, governmental and academic partners. Pujiang Innovation Forum is one of the most important events in this field in China. The grand theme of this year’s forum was “Innovation-Driven Development and the Role of Enterprises”. The forum was a very good fit for China-Finland ICT Alliance as it is run by MOST (that established ICT Alliance in 2009 together with the Ministry of Employment and the Economy of Finland) and it involves long-term key partners in Shanghai, the City of Shanghai, Zhangjiang Hi-Tech Park, and Tongji University as its main organisers. Prior and after to Pujiang Innovation Forum there were meetings and workshops organised by ICT Alliance in Beijing and Shanghai as described below. ICT Alliance was a member in the preparation team of the forum programme from the Finnish side among other Team Finland actors, as well as a member of Finland’s official Pujiang business delegation.

In his opening speech, Mr. Jan Vapaavuori, Minister of the Economy of Finlandhighlighted the current R&D&I efforts of the China-Finland ICT Alliance as an active joint platform in international innovation cooperation. The forum also had a number of other guest speakers and distinguished panellists, for example, Mr. Wan Gang, Minister of Science and Technology of China, Mr. Yang Xiong, Mayor of the City of Shanghai, Mr. Peter Vesterbacka, Chief Marketing Officer & Mighty Eagle, Rovio, Mr. Antti Pirinen, Vice President, Kone, and Mr. Pekka Soini, Director General, TEKES.

Key topics that were discussed in the forum:

joint R&D projects are a concrete way to support and encourage international cooperation;
need for new models in value creation;
how to more effectively allocate investments into knowledge and create new financing models; and
investments into learning and capacity building are essential for boosting industrial sectors.

The close cooperation between the City of Shanghai and City of Espoo and Chinese and Finnish high-tech innovation actors was highlighted by signing a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the Espoo City & China-Finland Golden Bridge Innovation Center and Shanghai Zhang Jiang High-Tech Park, by Ms.Tuula Antola, Director of Economic and Business Development of the Espoo City, and Mr. Lei Ding, Director of Zhang Jiang High Tech Park Administrative Committee.

The recent launch of the new China (Shanghai) Pilot Free Trade Zone and the Bund Financial Innovation Pilot Zone are signals of the open approach and interest in experimenting with new and innovative cooperation models. They highlight China’s position and aim at becoming key global node for trade, logistics and financial services. These developments are highly relevant to the ICT Alliance and they match Finland’s vision: working together with key international partners to establish an “Enabling hub for global digital business and innovation – where East meets West and South”. In the increasingly digital world Finland aims at providing open, trusted, transparent and reliable base for data and services. Combining highly available digital services and communication infrastructures with trusted and secure management of large scale transactional and personal data and identities would provide businesses and public actors a unique international hub for big data and cloud based services. And, fast growing digital business can also be fun, even in Finland, as illustrated by the well-known global games companies Rovio (Angry Birds), attending Pujiang Innovation Forum, and Supercell.

Z-Park Enterprise Forum with ICT Alliance: Faster from R&D&I to Business

Zhongguancun Science Park is one of the most intensive R&D&I foundations in China. To boost cooperation with Finnish companies, it invited 30 most innovative companies from its community to join the forum on Finland-China business and R&D&I cooperation on 30 October 2013 in Beijing. The key objective was to identify and discuss partnership between Finnish companies and Zhongguancun Science Park in the field of ICT and digital solutions and applications. The forum was chaired by Mr. Zeng Xiaotao, Managing Director, International Operations, Administrative Committee of Zhongguancun Science Park, and hosted by Mr. Yang Nan, Vice General Manager, Beijing Zhongguancun Software Park Development Co., Ltd. Mr. Jani Kaarlejärvi and Mr. Matti Hämäläinen presented current and future business activities and joint business initiatives of DIGILE and China-Finland ICT Alliance with the special focus on how joint R&D&I projects create business value for SMEs and which way it is possible to fasten processes from R&D to market entry for new solutions, products and services.

Following joint R&D&I interest areas were identified:

e-banking and e-commerce;
gaming;
data analytics;
5G technology;
cloud security ; and
future media technologies and platforms.

Zhongguancun became the first high-tech park in China in 1988 when the State Council approved the establishment of the Beijing New Technology Industrial Development Trial Zone (predecessor of the Zhongguancun Science and Technology Park). During the past two decades, Zhongguancun has gathered nearly 20,000 high and new-tech enterprises, including such as Lenovo and Baidu. Zhongguancun enterprises have formulated 86 important international standards like TD-SCDMA, McWill and IGRS, and about 800 national, local and industrial standards. Its technology transaction values exceed a third of the country’s total, including 80 percent of project products and services exported outside Beijing. In 2010, the gross income of enterprises in Zhongguancun achieved 1.59 trillion yuan, an increase of 22.6 percent, taking up about one seventh of all high and new-tech zones in China and contributing 23.5 percent to Beijing’s economic growth. Zhongguancun is home to 10 parks, namely, Haidian, Fengtai, Changping, Electronics City, Yizhuang, Desheng, Yonghe, Shijingshan and Tongzhou Parks as well as the Daxing Biomedicine Industrial Base. Zhongguancun’s venture capital cases and investment amount every year account for about a third of the country’s total. For example, Zhongguancun Software Park opened up an office in Otaniemi, Espoo, in 2012. Zhongguancun Software Park Development Co, Ltd is specialised in high tech park development and its establishment was granted by Beijing Municipal Government. Its three shareholder companies are Beijing Technology Park Construction Group, Beijing Capital Steel, and Beijing Haidian Technology Park. Zhongguncun Software Park Development Co, Ltd was founded on 7 August 2000 with initial capital of 500 million RMB ($62.5 million USD).

Companies that participated in the Enterprise Forum included, for example:

Qihoo 360 Technology Co Ltd (NYSE: QIHU) is a leading Chinese supplier of Internet products and services and mobile safety;
iSoftStone (NYSE: ISS) is a leading China-based IT services provider, serving both Greater China and Global clients.
UFIDA Software Co Ltd is the largest local management software provider in China and the Asia-Pacific region;
Beyondsoft Corporation offers end-to-end development and testing cloud computing solution and in 2013 was awarded “TOP 50 Service Outsourcing Players in China”;
Senscape Technologies is China’s first mobile augmented reality platform dedicated to developing high-tech company, augmented reality technology is the intelligence and wisdom of the city’s major tourist supporting technology;
Beijing GEO Technologies develops big data technologies to apply in the advertising industry, and its patent DataQuateTM technology platform processes 4TB real time internet audience profile data/day, coming from operator broadband and internet, and has managed advertising resources for blue chip clients including Citi-Bank, Pepsi, Peugeot, Johnson and Johnson, Suning.com etc.;
Anplat Co., Ltd. Is an industry-focused BI (Business Intelligence) standardized software solutions company;
Kingsoft Corporation Limited, as one of best-known software companies, is a leading software developer and Internet service provider in China, and on October 9th, 2007, Kingsoft was listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange;
ChinaCache (NASDAQ: CCIH) is one of the world’s leading providers of content delivery network and cloud services; and
Beijing Venus Information Security Technology Co., Ltd, listed on the Shenzhen Stock Exchange, has a perfect professional security product line. In the government and the army it has 80% market share of the world’s five hundred 60% of Chinese enterprises to provide safe products and services; in the financial sector, it has on policy banks, state-owned commercial banks, national joint-stock commercial banks to achieve 90% coverage. In the field of telecommunications, it offer the three operators, China Mobile, China Telecom, China Unicom, security products, security services and solutions.

Workshop on Creating New Solutions for Boosting Innovation and Entrepreneurship – Preparing China-Finland R&D&I Initiatives for Global Impact

DIGILE/China-Finland ICT Alliance, Sino-Finnish Centre and Tongji University in cooperation with eBEREA network partners organised a workshop on Creating New Solutions for Boosting Innovation and Entrepreneurship on 28 October 2013 in Shanghai – right after the Pujiang Innovation Forum. The main objective of this invitational brainstorming workshop was to discuss and prepare such new China-Finland initiatives in digital services and business that have potential for global impact. In additional to digital industries, e-commerce and Internet financing the potential of digital services and “big data” in environment, energy and urban environment were also on the agenda. These areas were represented byCLEEN (Finnish Strategic Centre for Science, Technology and Innovation in Energy and the Environment) and RYM (Finnish Strategic Centre for Science, Technology and Innovation in Built Environment Innovations) and INSIGMA from the Chinese side.

The workshop focused on some of the key themes of Pujiang Innovation Forum looking to identify concrete topics and models for industry, academia and public sector cooperation. “Innovation needs Capital” was one of the main themes of the forum, as well as the need to boost SMEs and start-ups and organise new kinds of industry clusters and networks with established players. In China-Finland cooperation the aim is to build the “2-way gateway” and also link other partners and markets in the Nordics, Baltics, the European Union as well as other regions, including the emerging economies.

Invited Chinese participants represented rapidly growing industrial sectors and especially those that are focal in China-Finland/EU R&D&I cooperation in the field of e-business and services, with Big Data as one common denominator:

e-service and e-payment;
e-logistics and supply chain finance;
P2P lending and micro financing research;
e-payment risk management;
text mining and sentiment analysis;
IT innovation and industry chain applications; and
solutions for clean technologies and smart buildings.

Chinese side participants include, among other, Prof. Zhangxi Lin (co-chair), Director, Sichuan Key Lab of Financial Intelligence and Financial Engineering, SWUFE and TTU, Mr. Li Defeng, Director, Research Division of Database, Huawei, Ms. Cao Heng, Director, IBM Shanghai Research Institute, Mr. Xie Shan, VP, Strategic Planning, Senior Researcher, Allinpay, Mr. Li Lele, CTO, Smart Logistics, Ms. Wang Xia, President, NoyaXe Technologies, Mr. Zheng Xianrong, Vice Director, Beijing Research Institute, INSIGMA, Prof. Xiaofeng Ma, Tongji University, Prof. Qiang Ye,

Associate Dean, Harbin Institute of Technology, Mr. Xiaolin Zheng, Deputy Director, eService Research Center, Zhejiang University.

Finnish side participants include, Mrs. Merja Hiltunen, Director (Steering and networks), TEKES, Mrs. Ulla Hiekkanen–Mäkelä, Executive Director (Marketing and communications) TEKES, Mr. Teemu Varonen, Programme Director, Senior Adviser (Finland–China collaboration in ICT), TEKES, Mr. Jarmo E. Heinonen, Consul (Science and Technology), Consulate General of Finland, Shanghai, Head of Tekes Shanghai, Ms. Karoliina Peippo, Communications Manager, CLEEN (Finnish Strategic Centre for Science, Technology and Innovation in Energy and the environment); and Mr. Vesa Ijäs, Head of Account Management, Lahti Development Company LADEC Ltd. (Vice Board Member & Representative of RYM (Finnish Strategic Centre for Science, Technology and Innovation in Built environment innovations). The Finland side organisers were represented by Mr. Matti Hämäläinen (co-chair), Director (China cooperation), DIGILE and Professor at Aalto, Mr. Jani Kaarlejärvi, Director (International Coordination), DIGILE, and Matti M. Hämäläinen, Director (Operations), Sino-Finnish Centre.

Workshop on Elderly Care Services Research in Beijing

ICT Alliance joined a workshop on International Research Center for Service Innovation for Elderly People (IRCSI) at Beijing Academy of Science and Technology (BJAST) in Beijing on 23 October 2013. The workshop involved participants from BJAST, Fraunhofer Institute for Industrial Engineering (Fraunhofer IAO), Aalto University, DIGILE and Active Life Village Ltd. It was organised to review progress in 2013 and plan joint activities for spring 2014,with milestones based on a pilot in Yangfangdian Community and key elderly care industry events in China during the planning period. IRCSIwasestablished in December 2012 as a China-German-Finnish cooperation platform by Beijing Research Center of Urban System Engineering (BRCUSE) of BJAST, and by Fraunhofer IAO with Aalto University as key University partner.

DIGILE and Active Life Village were present in the founding event and in 2013 the cooperation was formalised by the MoU signed during Ms. Paula Risikko’s, Minister of Social Affairs and Health, visit to Beijing on 25 September 2013. Services in the ageing society is a focus area in China-Finland R&D&I cooperation and BJAST and IRCSI are important entities in that work. During 2013 cooperation has been active between the Finnish, Chinese and German partners based on bilateral projects and several visits have taken place to China and Finland. While this cooperation continues in 2014 also multilateral research projects are considered including forthcoming China-EU calls under Horizon 2020. Experiences gained from the pilots in Finland and China and relationships established provide a basis for business-oriented research and development. With the support of BJAST President Mr. Ding and other key people of BJAST, cooperation has also opened up opportunities to meet with local and municipal decision-makers in Beijing to help pursue the systemic changes in the way elderly care is provided. In addition to technology, the work involves studying policymaking, financing, regulatory issues as well as concrete provision of training in the emerging field of digitally supported elderly services and assisted living.

Workshop on Espoo-Shanghai cooperation, Sino-Finnish Centre (Aalto-Tongji Design Factory)

The workshop on 25 October was organised to plan actions based on the agreement signed during the visit of Mr. Yang Xiong, Mayor of the City of Shanghai, in Espoo in August 2013 and the MoU to be signed at Pujiang Innovation Forum between the City of Espoo and Zhangjiang Hi-Tech Park on 27 October 2013. It was agreed in the workshop that the goals of this cooperation need to be ambitious as there is commitment from both sides (Finland and China) and a special Sister City relationship. Espoo and Shanghai together can represent key “Innovation Hubs” in Finland and China. In the next cooperation phase, the focus will be on areas where Finland and China can combine their complementary capabilities to address some of the priorities in China for creating globally relevant models and solutions and in particular to focus on topics where the City of Shanghai and the City of Espoo can make a different not only regionally but internationally. The areas have already been identified and the meeting focused on prioritising, action planning and agreeing on how various actors can best work together in the ”Team Finland” spirit.

The areas include education and training, and also vocational education and training. In addition to primary, secondary and higher education, there is potential for training business in the cooperation and also this is needed as we together move in new areas where education and training policy guidelines and regulations need to be developed. An illustrative example is rapidly booming “industry” of elderly services which is almost a “greenfield situation” in China and solutions can only be developed by working closely together. Other emerging priority areas include environment, energy, citizen centric urban planning and public services, among others. Espoo (and the Helsinki metropolitan region in general) and Shanghai are also actively developing tourism and have very complementary assets and approaches, and the opportunities for both areas are unique.

ICT Alliance & National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC) Meeting in Beijing

ICT Alliance had a meeting on 5G cooperation with National Natural Science Foundation of China on 30 October in Beijing, and the initiative received a positive response from NSFC. Key experts from the NSFC side were Mr. Zhaotian Zang, Deputy Director, Information Science, Ms. YingJie Fan, Deputy Director of International Cooperation and Ms. Xiong Xiaoyun, Deputy Director of Electronics and Information Systems. Prof. Xiaohu Ge, Department of Electronics and Information Engineering, Huazhong University of Science and Technology (HUST) joined as an expert representing substance expertise and research outline that has been drafted together with WiCO and the Finnish key research partners: University of Oulu, Aalto University, Tampere University of Technology, VTT, and HUST on behalf of the Chinese network research partners of the China-Finland ICT Alliance. All key Finnish partners are involved. The Finnish side was represented by Mr. Matti Hämäläinen and Mr. Jani Kaarlejärvi as well as Mr. Mika Tirronen, Counsellor for Science and Education, Embassy of Finland in Beijing, who represents in China the Ministry of Education and Culture and the Academy of Finland. In the meeting it was agreed that the topic of advanced 5G research will be taken on the agenda when new international activities are planned between China and Finland and the EU. This will involve preparatory joint China-Finland-EU workshop in Q1/2014 in Beijing with the support of NSFC, and initiating a concrete dialogue on ICT and advanced networking to be included in forthcoming joint call. Possibilities for multilateral programmes were also discussed.

More Information on China-Finland ICT Alliance and DIGILE

For more information, please visit the China-Finland ICT Alliance website www.ictalliance.org, DIGILE website www.digile.fi or contact Mr. Matti Hämäläinen and Mr. Jani Kaarlejärvi (firstname.lastname(at)digile.fi).

China-Finland ICT Alliance Workshop Week in China

Oct 15 2013

China-Finland ICT Alliance Official Phase II Kick-off Forum, Shanghai

The China-Finland ICT Alliance Week gathered Finnish and Chinese partners representing recently completed, new projects and selected future initiatives. It also acted as a forum for several different business meetings and workshop sessions including cooperation in areas such as cloud services, big data applications, traffic services, geoservices and navigation, environmental monitoring technologies and solutions,elderly care and assisted living.

China-Finland ICT Alliance had its official Phase II kick-off forum in Shanghai on 24-26 September 2013. The main objective of the forum was to further develop new ways of international R&D&I cooperation, in particular between China and Finland. One of the key objectives was also to prepare new Finland-China initiatives in the jointly defined areas,such as digital services, aging care, urbanisation, smart traffic, environmental sensing and monitoring, and education, and other areas.

In the opening words the two official ICT Alliance coordinators, Prof. Honglin Hu of WICO and Prof. Matti Hämäläinen of DIGILE, highlighted the results of the completed work in future networking, future wireless, and future services that exceeded the initial expectations and built a good basis for moving forward in the launched Phase II projects. The work now continues in areas of joint interest, including energy efficient networking, development of future digital services based on cloud computing, big data, in particular when linked with sensing and novel IoT solutions, and applications in intelligent cities, environment, ageing society among other. The China-Finland ICT Alliance has now been developed to a potential model for creating an open international R&D&I cooperation platform for all.

Dr. Xing Jijun, Deputy Director General of China Science and Technology Exchange Center (CSTEC) from the Ministry of Science and Technology of China, and Chairman of the Advisory Board of the ICT Alliance set a new target to develop the Alliance actively towards international cooperation. R&D&I cooperation would benefit from even broader international partnerships. The Alliance platform has been played an important role in strengthening relationships between China and Finland, and this has become a very good showcase of a bilateral, win-win cooperation.

Ms. Marja Aspelund, Consul General of Finland in Shanghai, highlighted that China-Finland ICT Alliance has very well met its objectives in stimulating cooperation between China and Finland. This kind of cooperation is exactly what is needed. Through the launch of phase II projects the initial scope has extended and expectations are even higher. There is still a substantial unleashed potential in this cooperation, and students and university campuses represent a unique environment for creating and testing new solutions. This aspect is included the ICT Alliance’s next phase activities. Together China and Finland are well positioned for co-creating new innovative solutions and global breakthroughs, and Finland can also act as a “gateway” linking the EU and other international partners and markets together.

Mr. Jarmo E. Heinonen, Consul of Science and Technology & Head of TEKES Shanghai, reminded that TEKES has been active in funding China-focused R&D&I projects since the 1980s, and China will continue to be one of the key focus areas for TEKES. Through R&D&I cooperation it is possible to open up new business opportunities for both partners. TEKES played an important role in setting up the China-Finland ICT Alliance in 2009, and now in 2013 TEKES funded new joint ICT Alliance projects with more than M2€. Expectations on the industrial and academic impact of the Phase II projects are high.

Dr. Fusheng Zhu, Chief Engineer of ZTE Corporation, pointed out in his industrial keynote speech that 5G is one of the key topics when discussing R&D in future networks. China has taken a very active position towards developing and testing 5G. Development of 5G is such a potential area that it should be also put on the China-Finland-EU agenda.

Prof. Sasu Tarkoma, Academic Coordinator of DIGILE’s Internet of Things programme & University of Helsinki, presented DIGILE’s IoT programme and how it promotes the creation and growth of ecosystems that involve companies, universities, and individual contributors. It develops IoT platform technology, an IoT hub, for the concrete and rapid realisation of IoT deployments and ecosystems. An IoT hub is a backend system developed for certain type of IoT devices. The hub controls the devices and stores the data that they produce solving the problem of device and data ownership. Anyone can setup an IoT hub and thus their size can vary from small to very large deployments. The programme also develops an open API for IoT hubs so that data and access to sensors can be provided to third-party applications and other hub instances.

All China-Finland ICT Alliance Phase II projects were presented including information on their current status and future activities. Project presentations will be posted on the Alliance official web site where also information of Information other ICT Alliance activities can be found: www.ictalliance.orgChina-Finland ICT Alliance New Initiatives and Partner Meeting Day
ICT Alliance New Initiatives and Partner Meetings Day was arranged to provide an opportunity to openly discuss, present and plan new initiatives in areas of joint interests and to meet with interested researchers and teams as well as companies.The day also provided an opportunity to become familiar with the Sino-Finnish Centre (SFC) in Shanghai, established for joint research, design, innovation, education and industry – university collaboration. It can also act as one local “platform” and forum for ICT Alliance activities in China.Many new initiatives were identified to be taken forward under the China-Finland ICT Alliance:

5G and new opportunities in Future Networks
IoT Hubs connecting IoT deployments across space and time for opportunities in experimental research, innovation and business
New open mobile and embedded platforms – open sw, open hw and open design
Intelligent spaces (e.g. smart home, smart living, assisted living and solutions for elderly)
Intelligent traffic and mobility of people in urban environments
Geoservices and navigation
Big Data and Cloud Services in China-Finland/EU cooperation
Green Campus – monitoring of energy use, environment (e.g. air quality) and user behaviour.

As a result of the New Initiatives meeting in Shanghai, followed by meetings in Beijing at the end of the ICT Alliance Workshop Week, active thematic groups of Chinese and Finnish partners were formed to work on the development of joint R&D&I activities in the above topics.

These range from linking the now funded Phase II projects to new pilots in China and Finland (e.g. in traffic and services for mobility in urban areas, monitoring on energy and environment), to extend current and new Business Ecosystem programmes to involve Chinese pilots and R&D partners, and to prepare for large scale Finland/Nordic/EU – China proposals in cooperation with MOST and in cooperation with NSFC as well as working with MIIT in large scale new digital services area.

The Business Ecosystem programmes being currently prepared in the China-Finland ICT Alliance context include Elderly Care and Active Life (ECAL) and Open Mobile and Embedded Ecosystem (OMECO) coordinated by DIGILE in Finland. The large scale initiatives are planned to involve key EU partners and Finland as “a hub” and some to be established with China-Nordic cooperation as a starting point.

Sino-Finnish Centre as the Finland-China cooperative hub in Shanghai Sino-Finnish Center has many industrially sponsored projects, for example, with Haier, Kone, Rovio, Microsoft, Pepsi, Volvo, Panasonic, Metso and Outotec. One area of activities at the Sino-Finnish Center is the co-creation of services for future cities and societal needs where the work together with China-Finland ICT Alliance is ongoing with “Design Embedded in Life” and “City On Demand”, as common themes. A specific focus area of the ICT Alliance is wellbeing and care for the elderly and the main results, on-going projects as well as future initiatives were presented to Finnish Minister of Social Affairs and Health, Mrs. Paula Risikko visiting SFC. The more detailed discussion on the ageing society services is below.

In the discussion it was also noted that for example Sweden and Germany and others have China-focused funding instruments set up and they have been successful in boosting cooperation. It was proposed that also Finland should have a foundation, “Finland-China Foundation”, that would focus especially on supporting and further developing Finland-China R&D cooperation.New initiatives and ecosystem programs DIGILE as the China-Finland ICT Alliance coordinator from the Finnish side, together with industrial and academic partners in China and in Finland, has jointly identified a number of areas as a basis for development of new initiatives, new research projects as well as the launch of business oriented ecosystem programmes to drive the creation of new breakthrough areas together.As an example, services for ageing society, including elderly care wellbeing and health, has been set as one of the priority areas for coming years. Population aging hits many Western and international societies and new health and aging related initiatives are currently being planned. DIGILE’s “Elderly Care and Active Life Ecosystem” (ECAL) will be the first Finnish international cross-SHOK ecosystem. It focuses on boosting business development between Finnish and Chinese companies, and it involves about ten actors at the initial stage – more to follow later. The fundamental objective is to take social innovations to market through co-creation and co-development.In the field of elderly care and wellbeing, it was recognised that following topics would require more actions. These same elements will also be highly relevant in other key areas of cooperation, such as urbanisation and environmental solutions:

understanding Chinese culture, traditions, and expectations;
involving training, regulation development and new business approaches and models leveraging the vast business opportunities;
linking public, private and consumer perspectives, linking bottom-up and top-down activities;
cities as key actors and decision-makers;
stronger business cooperation; and
bilateral funding instruments, aiming at developing solutions to jointly addressing the global markets

Other new initiatives include preparation of Open Mobile and Embedded Ecosystem in Finland-China cooperation. A workshop was organised at BUPT in Beijing on Open SW, Open HW and Open Innovation Platforms. Closely related to this “open innovation platforms” work is the development of new educational approaches involving university-industry cooperation in innovation and entrepreneurship and the development of scalable “Challenge” based approaches for that. A Letter on Collaboration was signed between China-Finland ICT Alliance / DIGILE and BUPT to promote cooperation in open SW and open SW and open design and to initiate discussions for inviting university and industry partners to join the OMECO Ecosystem as a key research and piloting partners in China.

A number of other areas are also actively developed as new joint initiatives and business-oriented R&D&I and business pilots. The Company Meeting involved discussions on cloud and big data service cooperation development in China and in Finland with companies such as Cloud Valley, Shanghai Guofuguangqi Cloud Computing as well as on geoservices with Wuhan based Geostar (WudaGeo).

More Information on China-Finland ICT Alliance and DIGILE

For more information, please visit the China-Finland ICT Alliance official website www.ictalliance.org, DIGILE website www.digile.fi or contact Dr. Matti Hämäläinen and Dr. Jani Kaarlejärvi (firstname.lastname@digile.fi).

Keynote address from Ms. Marja Aspelund

Sep 28 2013

Ms. Marja Aspelund, Consul General of Finland in Shanghai

Keynote address

China-Finland ICT Alliance Official Phase II Kick-off Forum, Shanghai, 24 September 2013

Dear experts and friends of the China-Finland ICT Alliance,

On my behalf, I would like to welcome all partners and other invited experts to this China-Finland ICT Alliance Phase II kick-off event.

I am delighted to notice that so many Finnish and Chinese partners have gathered this week to work on topics of joint interest and also to develop cooperation models and mechanisms even further.

This kind of cooperation is exactly what we need.

As we all are aware, China is a key partner for Finland in many areas.

Especially in the field of research, development and innovation (R&D&I), the importance of China has grown very rapidly during the last few years. China is number one in many fields.

China has its strengths, and Finland has its own. By actively linking these strengths and capabilities together, we can create a successful innovation environment for our business, industrial and academic cooperation.

This innovation-friendly environment is needed to develop new ideas, to test and to commercialise them and to create new jobs thus benefitting society as a whole.

To strengthen Finland-China R&D&I cooperation, many key decision-makers have visited China this year. Our President Mr. Sauli Niinistö visited China in the Spring and now very recently our Prime Minister Mr. Jyrki Katainen headed a business delegation.

Likewise, many Chinese leaders have been in Finland. For example, Mr. Yang Xiong, Mayor of the City of Shanghai visited the Helsinki Metropolitan area and Shanghai’s sister city, Espoo, in August.

One of the guiding themes of all these important visits has been innovation and the utilisation of new digital solutions in various areas of industry and society, including aging care, urbanisation, traffic, environment, education, and other areas.

In all these so called grand societal challenges ICT and digital services can produce very concrete solutions.

To enable so called systemic transformations, it is important to combine both top-down and bottom-up approaches and involve key stakeholders. In many areas the active role of cities is essential. City of Shanghai is a very good example of the development of future cities and we appreciate longstanding cooperation that City of Shanghai has had with Finland, and with City of Espoo in particular.

Also the education sector can take much bigger role in boosting innovation. In addition to facilitating research on specific areas of technology and application, the ICT Alliance has demonstrated its potential for becoming actively involved in ongoing developments in China’s education and innovation systems.

There is still a substantial unleashed potential, and students and university campuses represent a unique environment for creating and testing new solutions. This aspect is also included the ICT Alliance’s next phase activities.

When launching the ICT Alliance Phase II today, we are very happy to recognise that projects and activities focus on jointly identified key industrial and academic areas. For example:

Green communication: Energy efficient networking and future networks help address many needs in very rapidly growing wireless communication.

Intelligent city: Development of technologies for intelligent cities enable new solutions for traffic and various demand-driven services that again enable better use of resources.

Ageing: Finding solutions for ageing society, elderly care and wellbeing, are a common challenge. The scale in China makes it also a major opportunity for jointly creating globally unique and competitive solutions.

Environmental solutions: Environmental monitoring and sensing as well monitoring and control of energy use are topics that have gained a lot of attention and are included in Phase II projects.

Education: In the education area, ways of learning and supporting technologies are in transition. Finland together with China can create totally new solutions to learning by combining expertise in teacher training, in learning and brain research, in mobile and low energy technologies and in game areas.

China-Finland ICT Alliance has been active since 2009, and it has very well met its objectives in stimulating cooperation between China and Finland.

Now, at the launch of phase II projects the initial scope has extended and expectations are even higher.

Together China and Finland are well positioned for co-creating new innovative solutions and global breakthroughs.

China has extensive resources for research and development – and a large single market for highly scalable solutions. Finland has complementary expertise in key areas and can also act as a “gateway” linking the European Union and other international partners and markets together.

I wish you an interesting forum, and I am confident that the topics discussed here, including digital solutions for future networks, energy efficiency, navigation, sensing, and applications in traffic, wellbeing, environment, education and, others are exactly those that will create new business opportunities for both Finland and China.

By working together we can reach our global objectives in R&D&I.

Thank you for your attention.

6th ICT Alliance workshop in Shanghai

Sep 03 2013

Venues:

24-25 September 2013 – Workshop Day1 & Day 2: Shanghai Institute of Microsystem and Information Technology (SIMIT), Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), 865 Changning Road, 200050 Shanghai (http://english.sim.cas.cn/au/).

26 September 2013 – New Initiatives and Partner Meetings Day: Sino-Finnish Centre, Tongji University, 100 Zhangwu Rd , 200092 Yangpu District, Shanghai (http://sinofinnishcentre.org).

Organized by the China-Finland ICT Alliance Coordinators:

WiCO – Shanghai Research Center for Wireless Communications (host), and

DIGILE – The Finnish Strategic Centre for Science, Technology and Innovation in Digital Business

(note: TIVIT has expanded and been renamed to DIGILE in August 2013, see, www.digile.fi)

Accommodation:

Pentahotel Shanghai.

Address: 1525 dingxi road changning district of Shanghai.

Telephone: 021-3126, 6838

Website: http://www.lovegowu.com/skin_index_10201104_1_en

Map: maps_ICT_Alliance_Workshop_sites_092013

Contact info:

In case you need to reach us, for example when coming directly from the airport to the meeting, you may call/txt:

Matti: +358 40 758 0150

Jani: +358 40 540 7896

Tina Junying Zhong: +86 189 80000 119

Program of the Workshop

Day 1
Day 2
Day 3

24 September 2013: Kick-Off Day

Location: SIMIT

9:00 Opening of the Workshop by ICT Alliance coordinators

Chairmen: Prof. Honglin Hu, WiCO, and Prof. Matti Hämäläinen, DIGILE

9:05 – 9:40 Role of China–Finland ICT Alliance as a concrete platform for international cooperation

Mr. Xing Jijun, Deputy Director General of CSTEC, MoST

Mr. Jarmo E. Heinonen, Consul (Science and Technology), Head of Tekes Shanghai

Mr. Honglin Hu, Vice Director of Shanghai Research Center for Wireless Communications

Ms. Marja Aspelund, Consul General of Finland in Shanghai

9:40 – 10:00 Review of ICT Alliance: achievements, new projects and new Initiatives in planning

Prof. Honglin Hu, WiCO and Prof. Matti Hämäläinen, DIGILE

Summary of Results of Phase I projects

Moving Forward: Overview of Phase II new projects and activities for developing new initiatives

10:00 – 10:20 Phase II projects Kick-off and Photo

10:20 – 10:35 Tea & coffee break

10:35 – 12:00 Keynote speeches

5G Activities in China, Dr. Fusheng Zhu, Chief Engineer of ZTE Corporation

Internet Of Things and Future Networks, Prof. Sasu Tarkoma, University of Helsinki

12:00 – 14:00 Lunch

14:00 – 15:30 Phase I projects Wrap-up: Key achievements by project representative of Chinese and Finnish side

Future Wireless (15 min+ 15 min)

Jing Xu, WiCO

Chen Tao, VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland & Olav Tirkkonen, Aalto University

Future Networking (15 min+ 15 min)

Qimei Cui, BUPT

Mikko Valkama, Tampere University of Technology and Riku Jäntti, Aalto University

Future Services (15 min+ 15 min)

Honglin Hu, WiCO

Matti Hämäläinen, Aalto University

15:30 Closing of Plenary session

15:30 – 15:45 Tea & coffee break

15:45 – 18:30 Team meetings of Phase II projects

25 September 2013: Phase II New Projects Day

Location: SIMIT

9:00 – 9:15 Introduction to Phase II Finnish projects funded by Tekes “Finland-China Research Call”, Mr. Teemu Varonen, Senior Adviser, Finland-China collaboration in ICT, Tekes

9:15 Presentation of the 6 projects from Finland (presented by project lead, 20 min + 10 min Q&A each)

– Everyday Sensing (cloud, IoT, data analysis, and social media), Jukka Riekki, University of Oulu

– Sensing City Traffic, Timo Nyberg, Aalto University

– Energy-Efficient Wireless Networks and Connectivity of Devices – Densification, Antti Tölli, University of Oulu

– Energy-Efficient Wireless Networks and Connectivity of Devices – Systems, Riku Jäntti,

11:15 – 11:30 Tea/Coffee break

11:30 – 12:30

– Finland’s Enhanced Navigation using COMPASS/Beidou Signals, Laura Ruotsalainen, Finnish Geodetic Institute

– Finnish-Chinese Green ICT R&D&I Living Lab for Energy Efficient, Clean and Safe Environments, Heikki Pentikäinen, VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland

12:30 – 13:30 Lunch

13:30 – 13:45 Introduction to Phase II Chinese projects funded by MOST

13:45 – 15:15

Presentation of the 3 projects from China (presented by project lead, 20 min + 10 min Q&A each)

– IoT (applied to traffic information)

– Green wireless access technologies,

– Vehicle-to-Vehicle Communication,

15:15 Closing of the Plenary session

15:30 – 19:00 Reserved for partner and company meetings and presentations (3 rooms available at SIMIT)

26 September 2013: China-Finland ICT Alliance New Initiatives and Partner Meetings Day

Location: Sino-Finnish Centre, Aalto-Tongji Design Factory, 100 Zhangwu Rd , 200092, Shanghai

ICT Alliance New Initiatives and Partner Meetings Day is arranged to provide an opportunity to present and plan new initiatives in areas of joint interests and to meet with interested researchers/teams as well as companies. We welcome both those who are involved in the current projects as well as those interested in joining the future activities. The day also provides an opportunity to become familiar with the Sino-Finnish Centre (SFC) in Shanghai, established for joint research, design, innovation, education and industry – university collaboration. It can act as one “platform” and forum for ICT Alliance activities.

10:00 – 10:30 Welcome. Sino-Finnish Centre: an Environment for Collaboration in research, development, design, innovation & education, Matti M. Hämäläinen, Operative Director, Sino-Finnish Centre

10:30 – 12:00 Towards the future: extending current work and preparing new joint initiatives Chaired by Matti Hämäläinen, DIGILE & Aalto

Suggested topics for working groups are listed below. In addition to joint research activities the initiatives are suggested to include the following when fit for the topic:

– joint pilots in Finland and in China

– related joint education and innovation activities

– plan for scaling to international activities in EU and other international cooperation.

Introduction to suggested topics (5 min pitch each to introduce the topic before moving to working groups):

– New opportunities in Future Networks (5G, IoT networking, low energy, and other)

– IoT Hubs – connecting IoT deployments across space and time for opportunities in experimental research, innovation and business

– New open mobile and embedded platforms – open sw, open hw and open design

– Intelligent spaces: smart home, smart living, assisted living (e.g. solutions for elderly)

– Intelligent traffic and mobility of people in urban environments

– Geoservices and navigation

– Big Data and Cloud Services in Sino-Finnish/EU cooperation

– Green Campus – monitoring of energy use, environment (e.g. air quality) and user behavior

You are welcome to bring a poster to help introduce your position and for discussion in working groups. You may also choose to propose new potential theme for collaboration.

12:00 – 12:30 Pitches of the participating companies: introduction and interests in collaboration

12:30 – 13:30 Buffet Lunch

13:30 – 16:00 Parallel working sessions and company meetings

16:00 Closing of the day

Updated program can be downloaded from here:

ICT_Alliance_workshop_24-26092013_Shanghai_program_v_23092013-2

TIVIT visits Shanghai, Nanjing and Beijing

Apr 20 2013

TIVIT’s China representatives will visit Shanghai, Nanjing and Beijing on 20 – 28 April, 2013, to meet with WiCo, the China side coordinator of the ICT Alliance, and with representatives from universities, companies and government entities to discuss the next steps in ICT Alliance development. The aim is to prepare for new joint activities and this work will be done in close cooperation with Tekes and other key public R&D actors. The aim is also to involve both industry driven as well as public sector driven initiatives, and, for example, in areas such as aging society services, demand responsive solutions, energy monitoring and environmental monitoring, cities play the key role.

The next ICT Alliance Workshop will also be planned during the trip. The meeting will be held in China. The tentative time frame is 10-15 June 2013 and the event is suggested to take place in Beijing with meetings organized also in Shanghai to follow the official Workshop. The workshop will present the results of the first phase of projects and act as a kick-off for the new joint projects that are funded by the recent Tekes China cooperation call . The aim is also to present the new jointly identified areas of interest where joint R&D&I activities will be prepared.

Radical Design Week 2012 Workshop

Oct 28 2012

Workshop for discussing the potential of advanced technologies in improving the quality of life of the ageing population. China – Finland joint opportunities and platforms, including Active Aging initiative, to be discussed. The workshop brings together experts from universities, research institutions, companies, public sector entities, and NGOs to share their experiences and ideas on joint research and development.

Event Date:

Thu, 2012-11-01 (All day)

Venue:

Sino-Finnish Centre (Aalto-Tongji Design Factory), Shanghai

Participation:

Due to limited space and interactive nature of the sessions, the participation is by invitation only. If interested, please send email to:

matti.hamalainen (at) tivit.fi and junying.zhong (at) aalto.fi with your contact details and description of your interest in a few lines.

Co-organized by TIVIT / China – Finland ICT Alliance and Aalto University.

Click to download program first page (180kB)

Click to download photo posters (1mB)

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