The technical development work in DOME 4.0 was focused on working towards delivering an alpha version of the core platform. This work included the development of the back-end (underlying technology) as well as the front-end (user interface). The alpha version was successfully demonstrated at the second hackathon (11th –12th October 2023) in Leuven, Belgium. The beta version was demonstrated at the third hackathon (11th + 12th September 2024) in London, UK. The final platform was demonstrated on to the EC representatives on December 10th 2024, with all functionality integrated (including provenance, etc).
The technical work has been complex given the numerous heterogeneous data sources, a variety of open source and commercial (including 3rd party) software, as well as models of varying digital maturity associated with the individual cross-domain showcases. At the same time, the technical team also focused on semantically enriching the back-end and improving the front-end. Individual showcase connectors were developed, and these connectors were successfully demonstrated at the hackathon in Leuven, Belgium. In the last period, the showcases were fully integrated into the platform.
Regarding the nine (9) B2B showcases, the main focus in the first 18 months of the project has been on collecting data requirements, meta data, data acquisition and curation as well as preliminary execution of these showcases without depending upon the technology readiness level (TRL) progression of the DOME 4.0 technical platform. Every showcase has been systematically categorised into data inputs and data outputs and the showcase owners have been consulted to populate this information, often in an iterative manner. In the second 18 months, the nine B2B showcases were demonstrated in an offline (i.e. off the DOME 4.0 platform) mode. Workshops were organized in early 2023 to better understand the requirements in terms of connectors and onboarding of each showcase to the DOME 4.0 platform. There is now a roadmap for the offline and online execution per showcase, and on the configurations and developments for the DOME 4.0 execution.
The DOME 4.0 consortium engaged deeply with the sister project OntoCommons as well as other European initiatives in the digitalisation, data engineering, materials, and manufacturing fields. The key highlights included the invitation to join an international alliance, KGA (Knowledge Graph Alliance), interacting with other marketplace projects regarding minimum viable prototypes, as well as sharing key lessons learnt from a wide range of DOME 4.0 showcases involving cross-domain data sharing.
Dissemination and communication activities were further extended, with social media posts, website updates, newsletters and blog posts. Two hackathons and industrial engagement open days were also successfully organised in this period.
Finally, the value offering has been studied, including value streams, business architecture and business models, along with a market size study and sustainability action plan.
