5G solutions for verticals is a well-defined European objective. This requires developing 5G infrastructures to address a wide range of applications adopting flexible architectures, offering converged services across heterogeneous technology domains with unified software control. However, vertical industries today can only verify use cases in small scales in commercial environments, before investing in large scale deployments. Through ICT-17 projects 5G infrastructures become available to verticals to test their applications, however large-scale trials are still not possible. 5G-VICTORI will conduct large scale trials for advanced vertical use case verification focusing on Transportation, Energy, Media and Factories of the Future and cross-vertical use cases. It leverages 5G network technologies developed in 5G-PPP Phase-1 and Phase-2 projects 5G-XHaul and 5G-PICTURE and exploits extensively existing facilities interconnecting main sites of all ICT-17 infrastructures i.e. 5G-VINNI, 5GENESIS and 5G-EVE and the 5G UK test-bed in a Pan-European Infrastructure. The project will provide enhancements of existing infrastructures towards integration of a large variety of vertical and cross-vertical use cases. 5G-VICTORI’s platform aims to transform current closed, purposely developed and dedicated infrastructures into open environments where resources and functions are exposed to ICT and vertical industries through common vertical and non-vertical specific repositories. These functions can be accessed shared on demand and deployed to compose very diverse set of services in a large variety of ecosystems. 5G-VICTORI’s uniquely strong consortium brings together major players form ICT including operators, equipment vendors academic and research organisation and SMEs as well as main players from vertical industries including nationwide rail and electricity operators, rail technology vendors, media content delivery players and a number of SMEs focusing on advanced vertical services.

The ‘Middle East and North Africa Regional Architecture: mapping geopolitical shifts, regional order and domestic transformations’ -the MENARA Project- will study the geopolitical order in the making in the South and East Mediterranean Countries and the Middle East amid all deep-reaching social and political changes unfolding since 2010. The project aims at describing the main features of the regional geopolitical order, its origins, and evolution; identifying and mapping the decisive domestic, regional and global actors, dynamics and trends; building future scenarios for 2025 and 2040; and informing EU policies and strategies. It will examine whether, where and when conflict and/or cohesion dynamics prevail, the level and depth of regional fragmentation and the effects of regional and domestic processes on global dynamics and vice versa. This will be achieved by analysing ideational and material factors (national, sub and supra-national identities; religion and politics; global identities; demography; energy; economy; military; environment) and by conducting in-depth research on specific case studies on ongoing dynamics at three different levels (domestic, regional and global). All this research will be based on quantitative and qualitative methods -including fact finding missions on the ground, interviews, focus groups, Delphi surveys - and innovative foresight techniques. Research will be accompanied by pioneering dissemination methods willing to increase the project’s impact not only over the specific academic community and policy-making circles but also over broader general public. This will include the translation of research results into accessible deliverables such as audio-visuals, futures notes series, infographics and interactive maps, and a Massive Open Online Course.

IN2RAIL is to set the foundations for a resilient, consistent, cost-efficient, high capacity European network by delivering important building blocks that unlock the innovation potential that exists in SHIFT2RAIL: innovative technologies will be explored and resulting concepts embedded in a systems framework where infrastructure, information management, maintenance techniques, energy, and engineering are integrated, optimised, shared and exploited. IN2RAIL will make advances towards SHIFT2RAIL objectives: enhancing the existing capacity fulfilling user demand; increasing the reliability delivering better and consistent quality of service; reducing the LCC increasing competitiveness of the EU rail system. To achieve the above, a holistic approach covering Smart Infrastructures, Intelligent Mobility Management (I2M)and Rail Power Supply and Energy Management will be applied. Smart Infrastructure addresses the fundamental design of critical assets - switches and crossings and tracks. It will research components capable of meeting future railway demands and will utilise modern technologies in the process. Risk and condition-based LEAN approaches to optimise RAMS and LCC in asset maintenance activities will be created to tackle the root causes of degradation. I2M researches automated, interoperable and inter-connected advanced traffic management systems; scalable and upgradable systems, utilising standardised products and interfaces, enabling easy migration from legacy systems; the wealth of data and information on assets and traffic status; information management systems adding the capability of nowcasting and forecasting of critical asset statuses. Rail Power Supply and Energy Management create solutions to improve the energy performance of the railway system. Research on new power systems characterised by reduced losses and capable of balancing energy demands, along with innovative energy management systems enabling accurate and precise estimates of energy flows.

SF4S is a collaborative action with partners from HEIs, VET providers, innovation networks and business entities from the Agri-food, Health and the Mobility sectors. It supports our transition to a more sustainable European economy by helping to address the lack of green, digital and future (i.e. sustainability foresight) skills among students and professionals and by connecting knowledge flows between HEI, VET and industry actors that are necessary for Europe to develop cooperative solutions on a large-scale and support the recommendations for action in the major reports: Green Deal, NextGenerationEU, European Skills Agenda and OECD Future of Education and Skills 2030. We do this by advancing and scaling an innovative approach that we call Strategic Foresight for Sustainability (SF4S) based on best practices and methods from corporate foresight, sustainability management, green business models, digital skills and green product/service development across value chains and industries. SF4S is based on an entrepreneurial cooperative approach in our community of practice of 250 industry professionals and 100 HEIs, which develop engagement and insight from the three industries through 130 interviews, four large-scale co-development projects and the development, testing and deployment of learning and training materials for HEIs, VETs and business sector through the community. The ambition is pan-European, and 400 students will initially be reached through the SF4S project and its open access materials. The living community of practice will scale beyond the project itself, and into other industries. The long-term impact, which in itself is a starting point for European-wide transition, will be three industries adopting new sets of futures and future sustainability foresight skills, and both VET and HEI students entering the workforce with Foresight for Sustainability skills that enable them to create actions that support the long-term green transition that Europe needs.