The Government of Catalonia and a dozen Catalan economic agents, technology and knowledge centres, including Eurecat, announced last Thursday the creation of the Digital Innovation Hub of Catalonia (DIH4CAT) to accelerate the incorporation of advanced technology by Catalan companies and institutions.
This is a public-private consortium promoted by the Catalan Ministry of Business and Employment through ACCIÓ (the Catalan Government’s agency for business competitiveness), the Catalan Ministry of the Vice-Presidency and Digital Policies and Territory, Foment del Treball, PIMEC, Eurecat, the Computer Vision Centre (CVC), the Institute of Photonic Sciences (ICFO), the i2CAT Foundation, Leitat Technological Centre, the Polytechnic University of Catalonia (UPC), the Barcelona Supercomputing Center (BCS) and IESE Business School.
DIH4CAT aspires to be one of the European Digital Innovation Hubs selected by the European Commission and is a regional innovation ecosystem, coordinated with the main agents supporting digitalisation in Catalonia, and geared towards satisfying the challenges of the industry (and SMEs in particular) and public administrations through advanced technology testing, as a step prior to implementation. DIH4CAT is set up as a network service centre, a ‘single window’ where companies and public institutions can access technological capacity, solutions and infrastructure to drive their digital transformation.
The services that DIH4CAT makes available to SMEs, start-ups and public entities are mainly advanced digital technology testing and experimentation services through access to leading technology infrastructure; digital capabilities and advanced technologies; technology consulting prior to testing; specialist technology training; connection with the innovation ecosystem; and advice in fund sourcing.
The aim of this initiative is to make it easier for Catalan SMEs to be able to do trials and testing in the laboratories and infrastructures of the clusters that make up DIH4CAT before investing to implement them in their businesses. Thus, with an initial budget of 1 million euros earmarked by the Catalan Ministry of the Vice-Presidency and Digital Policies and Territory, aid of up to 10,000 euros will be granted to more than 100 Catalan SMEs so they can carry out these proofs of concept, prototype development or trials. The technologies that will be able to be tested will be linked to advanced manufacturing and robotics, 3D printing, super-/quantum computing, cybersecurity, artificial intelligence, big data, the IoT, 5G and photonics.
After meeting with all the DIH4CAT members last Thursday at Pedralbes Royal Palace to kick off the initiative, Jordi Puigneró, the Catalan Government’s Deputy First Minister and Minister of Digital Policies and Territory, assured that ‘this great domestic project that is DIH4CAT is a new display of the collaborative spirit that exists in Catalonia to drive the aspects of competitiveness of our companies, the connection with Europe and, especially, technological and digital transformation’.
On the other hand, Roger Torrent i Ramió, the Catalan Minister of Business and Employment, emphasised that ‘this is a strategic project that brings together the most important technology and knowledge players in Catalonia, which have and will have a crucial role for driving the digital transformation of the country’s industrial fabric’. ‘The DIH will be key so that more SMEs can carry out advanced digitalisation processes and will thus help Catalonia to take a leap forward from a technological point of view’, he underlined.
DIH4CAT also provides companies with a self-guidance tool to analyse their degree of digital maturity in a quick, simple and agile way. After completing the self-assessment using this link, companies can automatically obtain a customised report with their digital maturity evaluation, followed by a set of recommendations and next steps to move forward with their digital transformation; this will also be accompanied by the identification of the main resources of interest from DIH4CAT and the tech clusters that make it up.
Eurecat has participated in projects of this nature since 2016, the year when the European Commission launched the Digital Innovation Hub concept. In relation to DIH4CAT, Eurecat participated in the conceptualisation of the Catalan model, which was finally presented today, working together with the Catalan administration and the other members. During the presentation, Eurecat’s chair Xavier Torra highlighted as a key element the fact that Eurecat has delivered and will deliver ‘collaborative work and networking, the search for synergies between the various participating centres and the mission to serve industry’.
Eurecat coordinates the Advanced Manufacturing and Robotics (Fabricació Avançada i Robòtica – FAR) cluster, currently made up of seven other entities, and it will participate actively in the work of other clusters. ‘We’re convinced that projects and initiatives will come up that will require the participation of technologies linked to more than one of the clusters, which will increase the collaboration between the entities that make up DIH4CAT and the relationship with the DIHs from other European regions’, said Torra during the presentation of DIH4CAT.
For Xavier López, the Chief Operating and Corporate Officer, ‘this must be an important tool so that the companies in our country can not only cover their needs in the area of digital transformation so they don’t get left behind, but also to generate competitive advantages through developments and real applications of innovative digital technology developed in Catalonia, generating a significant impact on the competitiveness of the DIH4CAT members and the country itself’.
