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

Apr 16 2014
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China-Finland ICT Alliance: Newsletter: January-March 2014 435.43 KB

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.
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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).
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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.
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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.

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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.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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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.
 
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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.
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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:
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  • “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.

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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.

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