SYSGO AG

The MORAL project has two main goals. The first goal is to develop a completely European, ITAR (International Traffic in Arms Regulations) free microcontroller for space applications, focused on small satellites, flight control and payload computers for the purposes of mission control, earth observation, navigation and many other applications. The processor core of the microcontroller is based on a novel IHP Peaktop architecture, including novel, European instruction set. The microcontroller will provide mechanisms for increased reliability and adaptability according to the needs of the space applications. Besides the microcontroller, the required ITAR-free middleware, RTOS (Real Time Operating System) and toolchain will be also avThe MORAL project basically has two objectives. One is to develop a completely European, ITAR (International Traffic in Arms Regulations) free microcontroller for space applications, focused on small satellites, flight control and payload computers for the purposes of mission control, earth observation, navigation and many other applications. The processor core of the microcontroller is based on a novel IHP Peaktop architecture, including novel, European instruction set. The microcontroller will provide mechanisms for increased reliability and adaptability according to the needs of the space applications. Besides the microcontroller, the required ITAR-free middleware, RTOS (Real Time Operating System) and toolchain will be also available. Achievement of TRL 7 is planned. The other goal is to establish a new European company held by the core consortium partners involved in the project, which will target a trans-continental market. This new company, as the last stage of the evolution of the project, will sell the microcontroller and give support to the market. It will be focused to produce the microcontroller that can bootstrap the European market for space applications. In particular, we will target the fast growing small satellite market.

Software is everywhere and the productivity of Software Engineers has increased radically with the advent of new specification, design and programming paradigms and languages. The main objective of the project DECODER is to introduce radical solutions to increase productivity and by means of new languages that improve the situation by abstractions of the formalisms used today for requirements analysis and specification. We will develop a methodology and tools to improve the productivity of the software development process for medium-criticality applications in the domains of IoT, Cloud Computing, and Operating Systems by combining Natural Language Processing techniques, Modelling techniques and Formal Methods. The combination is a novel approach that permits a smooth transition from informal requirements engineering to deployment and maintenance phases. A radical improvement is expected from the management and transformation of informal data into material (herein called ‘knowledge’) that can be assimilated by any party involved in a development process. Thus, the DECODER project will 1) introduce new languages to represent knowledge in a more abstract manner, 2) develop transformations leading from informal material into specifications and code and vice-versa, 3) define and prototype a Persistent Knowledge Monitor for managing all relevant knowledge, and 4) develop a prototype IDE. The project will automate the transformation steps using existing techniques from the Big Data (knowledge extraction), Model-Driven Engineering (knowledge representation and refinement), and Formal Methods (specifications and proofs). The project will produce a novel Framework combining these techniques and demonstrate its efficiency on several uses cases belonging to the beforehand mentioned domains. The project expects an average benefit of 20% in terms of efforts on these use-cases and will provide recommendations on how to generalise the approach to other medium-criticality domains.

We are at the beginning of a new industrial revolution (Industry 4.0): disruptive technologies such as cyber-physical systems, machine-to-machine communication, Big Data and machine learning, and human-robot collaboration will transform the manufacturing and industrial automation sectors. However, Industry 4.0 will only become a reality through the convergence of Operational and Information Technologies (OT & IT). The European Parliament, says that “a very wide range of skills is required for [Industry 4.0] implementation. […] the convergence of IT, manufacturing, automation technology and software requires the development of a fundamentally new approach to training IT experts.” The FORA interdisciplinary, international, intersectoral network will train the next generation of researchers to lead this convergence and cross the IT-OT gap. The convergence will be achieved through the new concept of Fog Computing, which is a logical extension from Cloud Computing towards the edge of the network (where machines are located), enabling applications that demand guarantees in safety, security, and real-time behavior. Research objectives focus on: a reference system architecture for Fog Computing; resource management mechanisms and middleware for deploying mixed-criticality applications in the Fog; safety and security assurance; service-oriented application modeling and real-time machine learning. Our ambitious objectives require individuals with a unique combination of interdisciplinary and intersectoral skills. Thus, FORA’s 15 ESRs will receive integrated training across key areas (computer science, electrical engineering, control engineering, industrial automation, applied mathematics and data science) necessary to fully realize the potential of Fog Computing for Industry 4.0 and will move between academic and industrial environments to promote interdisciplinary and intersectoral learning.