German and Italian manufacturer of high quality leather products are looking for European partners to boost a digital traceability infrastructure

Short summary A German – Italian manufacturer of high quality leather is looking for European partners to apply for a research and innovation project on traceable leather products and processes. Academic partners are sought to develop IT solutions and tools for traceability of product components, or to set up platforms such as the EU Digital Product Passport. The company is looking for institutions that can support sustainability advice and possibly certification.

Full description The company manufactures high-quality bags, wallets and smartphone cases in the luxury price segment and distributes them worldwide mainly direct to consumers through their own retail stores, onlineshops and marketplaces. The project idea is eing promoted by German and Italian leather manufacturers, but the challenge for traceability in the textile industry is seen across Europe. Therefore, joint processing in a Horizon Europe project is sought. This topic fits thematically and requires research tasks and the development of at least one business case and an exploitation strategy to HORIZON-CL4-2024-TWIN-TRANSITION-01-05: Technologies/solutions to support circularity for manufacturing (Made in Europe Partnership) (RIA) Opening: 19 Sep 2023 Deadline: 07 Feb 2024

Advantages and innovations Medium-sized companies are aware of their responsibility to prevent damage to the environment. A partnership of three leather producers with locations in DE and IT wants to develop a global system to make their products and all components traceable. A standard should be set up to enable the system to be used for further processing by other leather manufacturers and in other industrial fields too.

Technical Specification or Expertise Sought The following expertise is sought to complement manufacturer's facilities: The R&I HE project required Academic Partners (who could act as a co-ordinator) from following sectors: • Computer science expert groups resp. for research and develop an AI powered Global Traceability SaaS system for SMEs with real-time capability: The challenge is scaling to small and medium-sized companies, using smaller plug and play systems with open interfaces, using mostly unstructued data, an operable standard system (less customization effort) and to consider demands on data protection, synchronous data etc. • A sustainability institute for giving advice to sustainability aspects in manufacturing, to support with certification and implementing standards • A consultancy to develop a business model in order to licence the technology and infrastruce as a Service (Saas) to other manufactures and other industries using digital tools for traceability end-to-end. • An experienced management partner/agency to support with the application, administration and documentation for the project

Contact / source: NEXT EEN Widgets (europa.eu)