Our R&D effort

AI4Work will investigate practical methods and tools for optimal sharing of work between humans and AI/robots. AI and robotics are likely to be most powerful means for radical improvement of working conditions in diverse domains, as they can support human operators in diverse tasks starting from difficult and tedious manual labor tasks up to complex decision-making tasks. The vision of the AI4Work project is to improve communication and collaboration between humans, AI and robots, allowing for an improvement of the working conditions within different processes in organisations in several domains in terms of increased efficiency of work, reduction in stress upon employees, increased confidence in decision-making process etc. Due to the high level of uncertainty in modern organisations an appropriate balance between human and machine activities must be found. The key assumption is that to cope with the required flexibility and dynamics, Sliding Work Sharing (SWS), where this balance varies during the operation depending on the situational context, machine-based confidence levels and human interactions, is likely to be the most appropriate for modern organisations. The key challenge of the project is to develop a set of common methods and tools (methodology framework, digital twin service platform, SW building blocks for SWS) that can be applied in diverse sectors and with different AI/robotics services, allowing for an effective experience exchange. The project will make use of living digital twins of working systems as a mean to increase efficiency and trustworthiness of AI/robotics solutions. By this, the project, aiming at improved quality of jobs and creating more decent work for human operators, will contribute to the acceptance of the AI/robots support of work in diverse domains. The project will be driven by six pilots in different sectors: logistics, manufacturing industry, construction, healthcare, education and agriculture.

M4ESTRO envisions to create an end-to-end trustworthy and transparent platform for Manufacturing as a Service offering active and predictive resilience and timely preparedness to disruptive events. M4ESTRO will foster an interactive, collaborative, and dynamic ecosystem where these stakeholders will operate in a hyper-distributed way to manufacture products by providing and receiving services in a secure and trusted manner. It will offer response actions to foreseen risk based on the intrinsic network’s flexibility while offer preparedness to unforeseen risks based on the documented resilience to switch action plans.

EU manufacturing is constantly becoming more productive with less, both in terms of material usage and energy consumption. The dynamics of global markets demand shorter product lifecycles and higher product variety, impacted by an increased volatility in demand. Traditional manufacturing systems are unsuitable to meet the new “think small” paradigm. They enable flexibility but at high operational complexity and for high volume operations to get lower cost production. To realise resilient factories and supply chains, it is mandatory to reduce complexity and cost of plug & produce modular manufacturing. MODUL4R envisions reliable, maintainable, affordable, (re)usable, and changeable SME-friendly autonomous modular factories and supply chains, able to manufacture new product in low-volumes and rapidly respond to unexpected events as well as the overall supply chain. MODUL4R proposes a holistic framework applicable both to new and existing manufacturing lines to achieve flexibility, rapid responsiveness, and sustainability. MODUL4R will be demonstrated in specialized mould manufacturing for the automotive sector, CPPS for flexible & modular assembly of PCBs, and tools manufacturing for the aerospace.

Zero-SWARM is a mission to achieve climate neutral and digitised production via a multidisciplinary, human centric, objective oriented innovative approach resulting in technical solutions for open swarm framework, non-public 5G network, active information continuum and digital twin. At the core, it establishes a unique forum where separately maturing technologies of 5G and cloud-edge continuum, data technologies and analysis (including data spaces and GAIA-X) and operational technology (automation and agility) break their siloes to co-design and co-create through 10 trials. It will showcase key achievements such as smart assembly, sustainable powertrains, improved resilience with remote operation, 5G powered PLC?s for real time distributed control systems, safe and autonomous transport of goods in factory, 5G enabled process aware AGVs, plug & connect 5G for industry, mobile intelligent agents for zero plastic waste, smart maintenance and optimization, remote quality control for zero defect resilient manufacturing. The project includes 3 nodes (north, center and south) with industrial test facilities from previous public/private investments co/creating with reputable industry players. Aligned with the technical activities, Zero-SWARM includes a tailored engagement program towards a wide audience, including collaboration with Digital Innovation Hubs and key initiatives in Europe. In addition, open innovation practices involves industry player as clients of developed technologies via Zero-SWARM community with 400 users and the expression of interest mechanism. It allows them to be the pioneer of the Zero-SWARM technologies, establishing an impact pathway even after the project end. Zero-SWARM puts strong emphasis on developing various learning materials to promote skill development of talented workforces with minimum efforts in prominent twin transformation, which will strongly contribute to build up European leadership in sustainable data driven manufacturing.

The transition towards a Circular Economy is estimated to represent a $4.5 trillion global growth opportunity by 2030. Digital Twins availability is largely recognized as an accelerator and an enabler of Circular Economy in business and in production, but significant challenges are still standing in relation to its development within the present technological framework, the needed skill sets, and the implementation costs. AUTO-TWIN addresses the technological shortcoming and economic liability of the current system-engineering model by 1) introducing a breakthrough method for automated process-aware discovery towards autonomous Digital Twins generation, to support trustworthy business processes in circular economies; 2) adopting an (International Data Space) IDS-based common data space, to promote and facilitate the secure and seamless exchange of manufacturing/product/business data within value-networks in a circular-economy ecosystem; 3) integrating novel hardware technologies into the digital thread, to create smart Green Gateways, empowering companies to perform data and digital twin enabled green decisions, and to unleash their full potential for actual zero-waste Circular Economy and reduced dependency from raw materials.

European strategy and research roadmap documents emphasise the significant societal and economic benefits coming from robotic and autonomous systems. Multi-Robot Systems (MRS) comprise distributed and interconnected robotic teams that can carry out tasks beyond the competency of a single robot. Although MRS offer improved scalability and performance, increased robustness, and mission enablement, the lack of a systematic engineering methodology, covering the complete engineering lifecycle and handling efficiently the salient characteristics of MRS such as openness, uncertainty, variability, and interplay of safety and security, results in solutions that fail because of fragile design and unrealistic assumptions. SESAME addresses these problems through an open, modular, model-based approach for the systematic engineering of dependable MRS. SESAME is underpinned by public meta-models, components and configuration tools supporting the dependable MRS operation in uncertain settings characterised by emergent behaviours and possible cyber-attacks. To demonstrate this timely and ambitious goal, SESAME combines five end- user-led use-cases (in the domains of healthcare, agile manufacturing, agri-food, and inspection and maintenance) with R&D competences of partners that have a long track-record in conducting cutting-edge research on robotics, model- based safety, security analysis, validation, and verification, towards the actual delivery of research results characterised by widely-used, sustainable and industrial-strength open-source software. An advisory board of world-class experts guides the development of SESAME.

Machining large parts requires more than just a lot of space. There is also a variety of sub-assemblies and the capability to customise (build to customer demands). This high degree of personalisation hinges on the design and the posterior verification after manufacturing. With this in mind, the EU-funded PENELOPE project will develop a methodology linking product-centric data management and production planning and scheduling in a closed-loop digital pipeline. The aim is to ensure accurate and precise manufacturability from the initial product design. The project is built to develop the methodology and vision in the following sectors: oil and gas, shipbuilding, aeronautics, and bus and coach. It will also provide the training enabling the workforce transition towards Industry 4.0.

Today’s manufacturing industry is in constant need of finding new ways to enhance processes so they can improve quality and minimise defects and costs. The EU-funded DAT4.ZERO project will develop a digitally-enhanced quality management (DQM) system to prevent faults. With the use of smart, dynamic feedback and feed-forward mechanisms, the project will contribute towards zero-defect manufacturing in smart factories. The DQM system combines smart sensors and actuators with existing large data sets to monitor process parameters such as temperature and vibration during machining operations to ensure correct quality outputs. New measuring equipment will also be used to collect data that will feed into intelligent decision-support to optimise manufacturing in smart factories and their ecosystems, which are characterised by smart logistics operations.

The CloudiFacturing innovative solution integrates software and hardware platforms to assist manufacturing SMEs and their demand for advanced cloud- or HPC-based ICT solutions. The EU-funded DIGITbrain project will extend CloudiFacturing with an augmented digital-twin concept called digital product brain (DPB) and a smart business model called manufacturing as a service (MaaS). The DPB will allow the customisation and adaptation of on-demand data, models, algorithms and resources for industrial products according to individual conditions. MaaS will permit manufacturing SMEs to reach advanced manufacturing facilities within their territories and beyond. The project aims to support the development of advanced digital and manufacturing technologies through more than 20 highly innovative cross-border experiments, in addition to training and assisting digital innovation hubs in the implementation of the Maas model, contributing to their long-term sustainability.

Cyber-physical systems-of-systems (CPSoS) are networks that interconnect cyber-physical systems and people. The focus is on increasing the intelligence of cyber-physical systems at the edge of the networks, so that they show cognitive behaviour and have a high degree of autonomy. The EU-funded 1-SWARM project aims to develop a modular framework for designing robust CPSoS networks characterised by swarm intelligence that meet industrially accepted open standards. Dubbed the 'Swarm Intelligence DevOps Framework', it will aid researchers to engineer CPSoS for diverse scenarios: food packaging and material handling operations, automated guided vehicles in dynamic environments, and flocks of aerial drones used to monitor retail shops.

An increasing number of interacting systems with strong connectivity are being used in both society and industry as computational and physical systems becomes mainstream. This confluence of the physical and the computational worlds has resulted in the so-called cyber-physical systems (CPS). The EU-funded HUBCAP project will provide a one-stop-shop to assist European SMEs in joining the CPS revolution. It will build on digital innovation hubs (DIHs) in seven European countries by creating a growing and sustainable European network offering SMEs opportunities to undertake experiments, seek investment, access expertise and training and form new business links. The aim of the project is to lower barriers for SMEs to realise the potential of growing autonomy in CPS by accessing advanced model-based design (MBD) technology, providing training and guidance.

Digital technology plays a big role in our transition to a circular economy, which aims to make optimum use of resources within industries. Investing in innovation is good for the protection of the environment, and it also contributes to Europe’s competitiveness. The EU-funded DigiPrime project will develop the concept of a circular economy digital platform in order to create circular business models based on the data-enhanced recovery and reuse of functions and materials. Specifically, it will create and operate a federated model of digital platforms for cross-sector business in the circular economy. DigiPrime will be validated through several cross-sectoral pilots, further detailed in 20 use cases covering different European industrial sectors (automotive, renewable energy, electronics, textile, construction), and by additional pilots in new sectors, funded through an open call mechanism.

The DIMOFAC consortium is issued from the leading European open initiatives on smart manufacturing, leveraging know-how from past and running EU projects such as INTEGRADDE, COMMUNION, HIMALAIA, BRAINPORT, iM²AM, MIDIH, MARKET 4.0 and building upon a pre-existing network of open DIHs and competence centers such as SMART FACTORY KL, PICTIC, FFLOR, AFH, MANUHUB@WG. Partners will further extend their services and networks to leverage on the increased flexibility brought by modular production systems.

The refurbishment and re-manufacturing of large industrial equipment in factories could help facilitate a circular economy. The EU-funded RECLAIM project will develop advanced technological solutions with built-in capabilities for in-situ repair, self-assessment and optimal re-use strategies. The project will deliver a decision support framework that guides the optimal refurbishment and re-manufacturing of electromechanical machines and robotics systems. The framework will use IoT sensors as well as prediction and process optimisation techniques to extend machine lifetime and increase productivity. RECLAIM’s solution will be tested in five real industrial environments to evaluate the lifecycle of the industrial equipment. The aim is to increase efficiency and move towards full re-use of equipment in manufacturing, which is the backbone of the European economy.

LEVEL-UP will offer a scalable platform covering the overall lifecycle, ranging from the digital twins setup, modernisation actions to diagnose and predict the operation of physical assets, to the refurbishment and remanufacturing activities towards end of life. In-situ repair technologies and the redesign for new upgraded components will be facilitated through virtual simulations for increased performance and lifetime. LEVEL-UP will therefore comprise new hardware and software components interfaced with the current facilities through IoT and data-management platforms, while being orchestrated through eight (8) scalable strategies at component, work-station and shopfloor level.

Furniture manufacturing is big business that accounts for more than 25 % of world furniture consumption. It is also going through a big transformation – from a Do It Yourself (DIY) to a Do It Together (DIT) approach. The EU-funded INEDIT project will create an ecosystem to transform the DIY approach within FabLabs into a professional DIT approach. It will capitalise on the knowledge, creativity and ideas of design and engineering conceptualised by interdisciplinary stakeholders and sometimes even new actors. To demonstrate the potential innovation around social manufacturing within the circular economy, the project will test it in four cross use cases: sustainable wood panels manufacturing and 3D-printing of wood, 3D printing of recycled plastic and ‘smartification’

QU4LITY (Autonomous Quality Platform for Cognitive Zero-defect ManUfacturing 4.0 Processes through DigitaL ContInuity in the ConnecTed FactorY of the Future) project will realize a radical shift from state of the art production quality methods to the disruptive Autonomous Quality (QA) concept, through enabling manufacturers and solutions providers to develop, validate, deploy and adopt innovative Cognitive Manufacturing solution for ZDM (Zero Defect Manufacturing) Maufacturing 4.0. It will be validated on 9 production lighthouse facility pilots.

TTS is involved in the implementation and validation of the Cognitive Manufacturing solution on 2 facility pilots dealing with Additive manufacturing laser machines production and white goods manufacturing.

The BIONET project aims at developing a cross-border Competence Center between the Ticino and Lombardy in the field of biomedical technologies and advanced therapies, with the aim of aggregating common and complementary knowledge from the Lombard red biotech sector and from Tessin (and Swiss) companies and research centers working in the advanced therapies field to achieve the critical mass necessary to promote the development of the sector. This objective is promoted through the creation of a software platform (TTS is in charge of its development) that guarantees the connection and networking of skills, research and development opportunities, infrastructures and services of all the participating subjects. Click here for more info

TTS is involved in the creation of a software platform.

MIDIH; aims at implementing a reconfigurable Digital Twin and Simulation avatar of the PoliMi didactic factory fully integrated with the MIDIH-RA. The I4.0Lab factory is an assembly of several reusable and general purpose functional components, therefore, the experiment will focus on creating their elementary Digital Twins and interfacing them with the real counterpart through the MIDIH infrastructure deployed at PoliMi.

TTS will be the exploiting partner of the developed software.

BeinCPPS aims at developing a platform based on a CPS (Cyber-Physical System) oriented approach, an embedded system able to interact continuously with the physical system in which it operates. First, the experiment will be developed intensively in 5 selected leading regions (Lombardy in Italy, the Basque Country in Spain, Baden Württemberg in Germany, Norte in Portugal, Rhone Alpes in France) and, later, expanded to across all European regions involving local competence centres and SMEs. The ultimate goal of the project is to significantly improve the adoption of CPSs across Europe through the creation and development of regional innovation ecosystems consisting of competence centres, manufacturers and IT SMEs.

TTS is involved in the second experiment, Lombardy region.

The purpose of 4D HYBRID is to develop a new concept of hybrid additive manufacturing based on the modular integration of compact, low cost modules (including laser source, deposition head, sensors and control). In this way it is possible to combine elementary processes in one hybrid module, to create with them hybrid machine tools or robots, base for a new generation of advanced hybrid production lines. The same process may be used in different phases of product lifecycle: for initial production, for defective parts inspection or recovery, for in situ repairing operations. These applications will be adopted in aerospace, oil & gas, and power generation equipment.

TTS is the coordinator of the task regarding the definition of a process strategy simulation tool, which is used to compare the current and the nominal part profiles and to analyse the distribution of the material over a 3D space. The main TTS role is to implement the simulation of additive manufacturing process.

Daedalus is conceived to enable the full exploitation of the CPS’ virtualized intelligence concept, through the adoption of a completely distributed automation platform based on IEC-61499 standard, fostering the creation of a Digital Ecosystem that could go beyond the current limits of manufacturing control systems and propose an ever-growing market of innovative solutions for the design, engineering, production and maintenance of plants’ automation.

In short-term, the general idea that lies behind the expected HyProCell outcomes is the utilization of an integral solution (the integrated multiprocess production cell) which will allow the production of small individualized lots in real applications in a cost-effective and more productive way. The objective is to optimize current cases and additionally seek for other applications, and open the possibility of having production cells very flexible and reconfigurable on demand.

TTS is responsible for the realization of a MES prepared to interact with company ERP and to support real-time strategic decision making, enabling a fast evaluation of many different “what if” scenarios in a system whose dynamics becomes too complex to be controlled manually by a person.

MAYA aims at developing simulation methodologies and multidisciplinary tools for the design, engineering and management of CPS-based (Cyber Physical Systems) Factories, in order to strategically support production-related activities during all the phases of the factory life-cycle, from the integrated design of the product-process-production system, through the optimization of the running factory, till the dismissal/reconfiguration phase. The concurrence and the cross-combination of the Cyber and the Physical dimensions with the Simulation domain is considered as cornerstone in MAYA innovations, to successfully address a new generation of smart factories for future industry responsiveness. MAYA finds complete validation in one of the most competitive, advanced and complex industrial sector in Europe, the automotive, where it will accomplish reduced time to production & reduced time to optimization.

The Project aims at developing Movement Assisting Devices (MADs), which are innovative, “passive” and highly customized kineto-dynamic equipment, built to provide natural compensation of human movements (both upper and lower limbs). MADs will be conceived and developed exploiting a generative design approach empowered by an innovative additive multi-material technology, to deliver specific mechanical properties, while also supporting embedded optimized electrical connections within the custom made parts.

TTS is responsible for the development of the MovAiD Integration Platform, capable to handle the value chain coordination and to exploit constant monitoring of MADs generated data, towards efficient sales, spare parts supply, and service provision.

A substantial resource efficiency improvement has already been achieved in process industries over the past years but further technological breakthroughs are needed to pass beyond current day limitations. Most measures focused on optimising the internal use that a single company does of its required resources (both energy and materials), in order to improved local productivity. The real benefits for drastic sustainability improvements are to be found in stronger synergies between multiple autonomous entities. The state of the art have shown very few examples of this “Industrial Symbiosis”, but the technological framework to propel their adoption is still missing  SYMBIOPTIMA project proposes to tackle those objectives through a completely new paradigm for industrial clusters: the human-mimetic symbiosis. Drawing inspiration from one of the most complex biological organism (the human body), synergy and optimization of the flows of a cluster are obtained thanks to the hierarchical decentralization of operations management tasks to multiple collaborating Production Units, integrating at inter-plants and cross-sectorial level the monitoring, supervision and shared optimization of their activities. SYMBIOPTIMA promotes the mutual interaction of diverse industries, also among different sectors, for beneficial reuse of flows (water, waste, by-products, energy, recycled materials, etc.) that could result in a more resource-efficient production at network level, and in fewer adverse environmental impacts.

TTS is responsible of the development of a tool supporting the implementation of economical and Life Cyle Sustainability Assessment (LCSA) indicators and objectives that will be used during the optimization phase.

The MAN-MADE project aims at defining new socially sustainable workplaces where the human dimension is a key cornerstone. Moreover the project promotes the vision of an effective integration of this anthropocentric factory within the social environment toward the implementation of context-aware factories that promotes and take advantage of extended services to the workers in terms of accessibility, inclusiveness, efficiency and work satisfaction. The context aware anthropocentric manufacturing model promoted by the project will be demonstrated by pilot implementations in the Transportation industry (Alstom) and in the White-goods sector (Whirlpool), two European industrial sectors of excellence. The project concepts will be also tested in the Factory of the Future lab available at the Polytechnic of Milan. Expected benefits from the MAN-MADE project will have a huge impact on the productivity rate due to an enhanced use of human resources and reduction of accidents, and will leverage on the high number of workers involved in the white-good and transportation sector. The MAN-MADE project will contribute to the achievement of best in class performance, making available advanced anthropocentric workplace technologies, that also support a considerable improvement of worker integration in the social environment. The MAN-MADE impact is also guaranteed by the influence and relevance of the project actors such as Whirlpool (with more than 14.000 workers) and Alstom (with more than 92.000 workers worldwide).

TTS effort in the project is focused on: definition of the overall architecture of the ManMade production planning and human resources organization platform design and development of the job designer module deployment of the services configurator tool validation of the job designer module in the two industrial cases.
Job Designer

The CTC project aims to support European Industry to adapt to global competitive pressures by developing methods and innovative enabling technologies towards local flexible manufacturing of green personalized products close to the customer in terms of features offered, place of fabrication, time to deliver, and cost. This vision is implemented and demonstrated within an European industrial sector of excellence: the furniture sector (151.000 companies, annual turnover of more than 130 Billion Euro, total workforce of 1,4 million). The ultimate implementation envisions a “green factory behind a glass pane” directly in the Shopping Mall, where the customer witnesses the manufacturing of its personalized furniture. CTC vision of local flexible manufacturing of green personalized furniture is to be implemented by the development of 5 pillars: Development of a Formalized Design Approach and related software technologies for "design to manufacturing in one step"; Development of a standardized mini-factory Production System Model Implementation of the local “Context Aware” Factory (which is the instantiation of the “Production System Model” afore mentioned in the second Pillar) Development of the CTC woodwork machining system, capable to empower the “Close to the Customer” concept Development of the CTC Green Label Anticipated results from the CTC project are expected to have a huge impact on the European economy, also considering the high number of actors involved and the overall dimensions of the furniture sector.

The Pathfinder project investigates, the role of simulation and forecasting technologiess(S&FT) as a lever to increase manufacturing performance and proposes the development of a roadmap capable to clearly point out the key challenges for these technologies future development.

Within Pathfinder, TTS has the main coordination role. TTS steers efficiently the consortium towards the definition of the challenges for the next generation simulation technologies, identifying then the Research Priorities to be pursued to face those challenges.

The project aims at promoting innovation in the "forming machine tools" made in Italy industry, specifically to identify new competitive tracks based on a radical improvement of performances in relation to: productivity Targets identified relate to:  a reduction of production time per kg of product  a reduction of production waste  improving the maintainability of the machine environmental sustainability objectives identified are: reduction of raw material per kg of finished product  reduction in energy used per kilogram of finished product  reduction in the amount of by-products process per kilogram of finished product  reduction of spaces occupied

TTS has coordinated a consortium with about 20 partners, companies and universities, among the most important representatives of the forming industry in Italy. TTS prepared the project proposal and now deals with project management activities. From the technical point of view, TTS develops innovative tools for 2D and 3D simulation of machines and plants.

PRIME aims to create new solutions for deployment by SMEs of highly adaptive, reconfigurable self-aware plug and produce assembly systems, which will use multi-agent control, dynamic knowledge sharing, integrated monitoring, and innovative human-machine interaction mechanisms. These next generation assembly systems equipped with PRIME technology will be able to proactively support rapid reconfiguration, adaptation, error-recovery, and operational performance improvement. This will lead to a dramatic cost and time reduction of deploying and maintaining complex assembly systems on demand and improve their effectiveness.

TTS coordinates the WorkPackage 4 (Performance Monitoring and Self-Awareness and Adaptation) and, in addition to contributes to incorporate self-awareness in plug-and-produce systems, it will also lead Task 3.4 (System Configuration and Simulation Tool)  and supports the deployment of an intelligent machine interface, based on its wide expertise in the field.

Apps4aME aims at the comprehensive consideration of ICT-based support of Manufacturing Engineering in its domains, called advanced Manufacturing Engineering (aME). The different life cycles will be aligned by the development of a reference model that provides a detailed overview of all relevant domain specific and inter-domain interdependencies. This life cycle-oriented model enables an integrated product design, process development, factory planning as well as production planning and factory operation. These processes will be supported by Engineering Apps (eApps) that will be conceived, developed and validated with two industry-driven scenarios, implemented in three demonstrators: automotive, machining and food industry. The realization of Apps4aME will increase the productivity in all Manufacturing Engineering activities with creating more reliable and efficient manufacturing conditions. Using this, Apps4aME supports the achievement of higher process robustness and accuracy to provide the customers with higher and more stable product and service quality.

TTS is strongly involved in the Engineering Applications (eApps) development activities inside the Work Package 4 with the leadership of task 4.4. Specifically, TTS will collaborate with Fraunhofer-IPA, ITIA-CNR, CADS and Carmolimp for the development of innovative mobile applications aiming to the optimization of the production in the food industrial sector.   A demo version of the Picking eApp that has been developed within the project can be downloaded.

The project uttermost objective was to foster and strengthen the primacy of Future European Manufacturing by defining the next generation Virtual Factory Framework. The VFF promoted major time and cost savings while increasing performance in the design, management, evaluation and reconfiguration of new or existing facilities, supporting the capability to simulate dynamic complex behaviour over the whole life cycle of Factory, approached as a complex long-living Product. Thus the project researched and implemented the underlying models and ideas at the foundation of a new conceptual framework designed to implement the next generation Virtual Factory.

TTS role within the project combines strategy definition actions and implementation activities. TTS was responsible of the development of the virtual factory data model and was the coordinator of the development of the VF manager, the next generation MDM platform.

The S-MC-S project aimed at supporting European manufacturing enterprises to adapt to global competitive pressures by developing methods and innovative enabling technologies towards a personalized, customer-oriented and eco-efficient manufacturing, across a broad range of sectors. To this end, S-MC-S vision is to deEnd and research a new production paradigm, Sustainable Mass-Customization, while also presenting Customization as one of the main driving forces behind the future success of Sustainability.

TTS dealt with the development of factory planning tools. Those are meant, beside the capability to design, implement and evaluate a production system, also to provide an evaluation of the mentioned system in the space of sustainable solutions.

Logistics networks accumulate over 1 billion new items of information per month, generated every minute of each day by thousands of pallets travelling on hundreds of trailers for more than one million customers under hundreds of thousands of postcodes, each with multiple different service requirements. Patterns and dependencies in 50 million or more data elements can only be analysed by intelligent data-mining approaches linked to strategic decision making based on longer term analyses of billions of pieces of information. ADVANCE wanted to develop an innovative predictive-analysis-based decision support platform for novel competitive strategies in logistics operations.

TTS contribution was mainly focused on the development of tools meant to support in knowledge acquisition and formalization and in exploiting and disseminating project results.

The European Machine Tools (MT) manufacturing industry faces an intense and growing competitive pressure brought forth by developing countries, which have been entering the global market offering low-cost standard products. Moreover, these countries are rapidly modernizing their production methods and enhancing their technological capabilities. Competition from other high-tech regions is also strong. SOMMACT aims at supporting the transformation of the machine tool industry to strengthen Europe's ability to compete in terms of high added value for the customer. Small and single batch production - particularly for large (some cubic metres), heavy (several tons) and complex work pieces (e.g. moulds) - is still a challenge for MT users.

Strongly involved since the project concept, TTS has supported the administrative management of the project and, from a technical point of view, was mainly involved in the design and implementation of a self-learning model of the system performance, accumulating knowledge on the machine behaviour, based on calibration and real-time measurement data, and on their relationship with work piece characteristics (e.g. mass) and with the environment (e.g. temperature).

European Shoe Manufacturing industry faces an intense and growing competitive pressure brought forth by developing countries, which are entering the global market offering low-cost workforce for the production of labour-intensive, low value added products. DOROTHY aims at transforming the shoe industry and its related business model for strengthen Europe's ability to compete in terms of high added value for the customer. This transformation relies, on one hand, on the development of tools for the design of customer driven adding value shoes and, on the other hand, on the realization of tools for the design, configuration and reconfiguration of flexible multi-site multi-nation production factories, meant to manufacture those customer driven shoes. DOROTHY mission is to "design customer driven shoes everywhere, manufacture them intelligently anywhere".

Heavily involved in project management, TTS focused its research efforts in the development of innovative design tools enabling the implementation of the Mass Customization paradigm in shoe manufacturing technologies.  TTS was also involved in the development of the innovative DOROTHY business model.

The project originated from the meeting of heterogeneous skills: on one hand the textile world (especially silk manufacturers) and, on the other, the medical world, represented by the Niguarda Hospital. The project aims at manufacturing scaffolds prototypes composed of fibroin and other materials, meant to be adopted for the implantation of pancreatic islets to treat diabetes. The shape of the scaffold is very complex. For this reason a textile machine manufacturer has been involved, together with experts in 3D textile weaving.

TTS has supported research centres in formalizing the idea, creating the partnership and presenting the project proposal. Afterwards, TTS role deals with project administration and support in project technical coordination.

Alloderma was focused on the development of innovative solutions to be adopted in heterogeneous contexts (from biomedicine to PC games) meant to record and reproduce hands movements in virtual environment. The project led to the creation of working prototypes consisting of high-performing textile components (two-way stretch fabrics with a high level of comfort, lightness, wearability) and an electronic component capable of providing realistic and real-time hand movements representation.

TTS has supported research centres in formalizing the idea, creating the partnership and presenting the project proposal. Afterwards, TTS role deals with project administration and support in project technical coordination.

Nepi started with the goal to create a common place for facilitating the meeting between innovation seekers and innovation providers. The first group was represented by companies from the entire pulp & paper supply chain, demanding for new opportunities achieving competitive advantages, the second group is formed by universities and research centres, investigating on new technologies and innovation opportunities. Various meetings and visits have been organized, involving experts and technologists and resulting in long-lasting partnerships between many players in Lombardia region.

The role of TTS has focused on the proposal setting up and presentation, on the formalization of tools for technological and innovation auditing, on data collection and data analysis. Main goals achieved relies in the organization of a network of contacts consisting of scientists, experts and facilitators who favoured the interaction between companies and research centres in the pulp & paper industry.

Timat is an initiative that originated from the meeting between experts with complementary skills and knowledge, working in strict contact with the textiles and clothing sector. Major objective was the economic promotion of the sector in the Lombardia region, particularly focusing on areas with structural difficulties. The results were remarkable: technology audits involved more than 30 companies, representing the entire value chain, events and exhibitions were organized with over 200 participants, both public and private. All these actions drove to more than 50 innovation ideas, then formalized into 10 research projects presented and, partly acquiring further funding.

TTS played a crucial role during the entire project lifecycle, starting from the setting up of the initiative, through the collection and formalization of industrial requirements until the translation of needs into project ideas. Important was also the role played in the creation of ICT tools acting as enabling technologies for the project activities.

The DiFac project aimed at the development of an innovative Collaborative Manufacturing Environment (CME) for next generation digital manufacturing. The DiFac CME will be used as a framework to support group work in an immersive and interactive way, for concurrent product design, prototyping and manufacturing, as well as worker training. It provides support for data analysis, visualization, advanced interaction and presence within the virtual environment, ergonomics analysis, and collaborative decision-making.

The role of TTS was to set up the validation scenarios based on real case studies and to validate it.

The overall goal is to move the footwear sector from a product / process centred approach to a human-centred approach represented by 3 dimensions of human being: Comfort, Environment, Custom. This approach calls for a thorough transformation of the traditional "concept" of the shoe into a new "device" capable of satisfying the demands of the consumers along three dimensions, particularly:  Comfort: Focus on the foot, in all aspects of walking, running, standing, well being, so comfort  Environment: Societal focussing on 100% nature friendly materials and process sustainability. Move the sector to eco efficient and sustainable products, processes, materials and organisations  Custom: Consumer involvement focussing on style and fashion

TTS was task leader for the definiton and development of a simulation framework that allows to analyse and evaluate a shoe production network in an innovative way because it's based on integrated simulators linked to a hierarchical structure of performance indicators. This framework was tested on a real case study coming from HUGO BOSS shoe plant.

The KoBaS project aims to provide a breakthrough in the current practices in the use of manufacturing machines, developing a set of generic tools of new conception meant to enable the quick customization of software solutions meant to provide, on one hand, an advanced task and process planning and, on the other hand, machine maintenance, training and management support, founded on techniques such as Virtual Reality, 3D and Discrete Events Simulation, Knowledge Based System and Finite Element Analysis, evolved, combined and optimized in their interaction thanks to a new brand of innovative technologies that are the main object of KoBaS.

Besides coordinating all the project activities, TTS takes part to the technical development realizing the simulation module that allow to simulate the production machine in all of them aspect: from 3D visualization to collision detection, from kinematics to real time surface modification for tool processing simulation.

Modern production industry is forced to react on changes in 3 levels:  Production resources: Multiple production sites and dynamic customer's requirements in different European regions induce a field of tension in which resources should be standardised adaptive. The project aims at a new generation of production resources which combines advantages of standardisation and specialisation  Factory organisation: Using these resources reveal challenges in factory's' organisation. Modularized architectures are promising concepts for the future. The proposed project aims at applying them to European companies  Plant engineering (PE): Information technologies like virtual-reality are suitable means to reduce time and improve planning results. The project aims at automatically configuring & controlling resource modules.

TTS collaborated in the development of the modules for the manufacturing control and plant emulation and for the integration of Virtual Reality with Discrete Event Simulation (DES).

The SYMPHONY project aims to create a dynamic management methodology with integrated methods and tools to support SMEs in their key management process to compete in a turbulent environment. SYMPHONY is based on the concepts of resource-based strategy, knowledge based, and learning enterprises as pillars for knowledge-based and adpative companies able to manage their responsiveness and adaptation in the current market. It's focused on high-tech or service orienteds companies with high-information part in their value chain.

TTS, as a solution provider in the field of system integration, supported the software development of the knowledge based systems related to the Knowledge Creation methodology.

The basic goal of INCOMPRO project is to develop an Intelligent Engineering Framework, calledVirtual Engineering Environment (VEE) that supports the design and the virtual prototyping of new application based on composites. VEE is an integrated, computer simulation platform that allows design, development and testing of a product before it is actually built, thus eliminating many of the intermediate and costly experimental tests, while saving a consistent amount of energy and wasted scraps.

TTS collaborated in the development of the Virtual Engineering Environment (VEE). In particular has developed the CORBA compliant interface to allow exchange data design between the modules composing the VEE.

TTS provided its contribution since the initial stages of the initiative, formalizing the idea and supporting in partnership creation. Working with Electrolux Italia, ABB, and ITIA-CNR, TTS prepared the project proposal that was submitted and funded by the Italian government. During the project, TTS coordinated the administrative actions and collaborated in the technical implementation with 2D and 3D simulation of new machines and plants.

The Manufuturing project aims to create a Self-Innovating Extended Factory (SIEF) that combines a real factory with a virtual one for better desision making. The SIEF is a collaborative network of research institutes, manufacturers and related organisations that work together to improve the factory. A SIEF has two parts: a virtual factory and a physical factory. The physical factory is a real factory. For the virtual factory, computer-aided design tools, virtual reality and other similar technologies are used to simulate the production process. Intimate communication between the two means experience gained in the virtual factory can be put to use in the physical factory, and vice versa. Electrolux Zanussi was the main contractor of italian project.

TTS worked tightly with Electrolux Zanussi over all the four years project in order to develop innovative methods and tools mainly for the virtual factory part of the SIEF. The prototypes developped during the project were applied to set-up a new factory in the north Italy with the main goal to produce 10 milions motors for domestic refrigerators per year. This project provides to Electorulx management a way of seeing the wider picture when introducing new technology. Rather than simply basing a decision to buy new equipment on the belief that it will improve production, the companies will be able to consider other aspects before implementation such as the need to re-train personnel, the set-up times required and potential start-up problems