Dissemination Activities Report – Intermediate (D8.1)

This deliverable describes the strategy followed and the achievements of the PHAROS project in the first reporting period (from December 2014 to February 2015) in terms of dissemination activities, as well as the exploitation plans with regard to the identified exploitable knowledge in a per-partner basis.

The dissemination activities in the PHAROS project focus on making available the foreground generated during the project to the relevant audience, on the one hand to improve the concept with expert feedback and on the other hand to increase the project impact. The PHAROS project aims at designing and implementing an innovative multi-hazard open service platform which integrates space-based observation, satellite communications and navigation (Galileo/GNSS) services to provide sustainable (pre-operational) services for a wide variety of users in multi-application domains, such as prediction/early detection of emergencies, population alerting, environmental monitoring, crisis management and risk management, targeting several users (crisis managers, operators of critical infrastructures, insurance companies, academic, etc…). In this context, the identified relevant audience splits in three groups:

• The general public, as beneficiaries of the overall system and as intended recipients of the generated alert messages;
• The scientific community in the research areas tackled by the project;
• The potential PHAROS system users (both primary and secondary), as defined in [1]. These users comprise public entities, such as governmental administrations, disaster management authorities, first responders and operators of critical infrastructure, with focus on European countries, as well as third parties which might be interested in the products provided by PHAROS, such as academia and insurance companies.

To reach these relevant communities, a strategy has been followed that applies a variety of dissemination channels, using the most suitable channels for each target group. According to this target groups, the project has so far implemented dissemination activities in three major areas:

• General high level dissemination activities, including the project website and newsletters. It shall be noted that a flyer is planned for the coming period.
• Focused dissemination to end users, by setting up an advisory board of end users that participates in the project workshops, interviewing end users and participating in events that are relevant to the end user community, such as conferences and congresses. The workshops organised within the project have been applied not only to disseminate the results to end users, but to involve them in the conception and design phases of the project ideas and system.
• Focused dissemination to the scientific community by participating and contributing to relevant conferences to the research areas of the project. During this first reporting period, mostly end-user oriented conferences and dissemination events have been tackled, while for the coming period, also scientific journal publications are planned, since the project will have provided a series of scientific results during this period, ready to be disseminated. A total of eight conference contributions (including papers, posters and presentations) have been published or accepted for publication during the first project reporting period. Two contributions have been submitted and four are being prepared for submission.

The project team has also established several cooperation frameworks with different initiatives during this reporting period. Among the existing cooperation frameworks and liaisons with other projects, two major types can be found:

• Established liaisons or contacts with other projects and initiatives: this category includes the already established contacts and liaisons with currently on-going projects and initiatives, describing the scope of the corresponding projects, the synergies with PHAROS, the expected outcome of the liaison and the activities carried out in order to establish and maintain the contact to fulfil the objectives. Within this group, two sub-groups can be found: liaisons which were already considered in the PHAROS description of work (DoW), such as the liaison with the BiROS mission and liaisons which were not identified in the DoW but which are considered to be beneficial for both of the projects or initiatives involved, improving their outcomes.
• Identified synergies: this category includes a list of synergies with other projects and initiatives which have been identified but for which no activities have been carried out for the time being. Tracking of these synergies has been pointed out as an important task to be performed so that the Consortium is aware of any relevant activity and liaison or cooperation actions can be triggered, if deemed necessary.

The identified cooperation frameworks are intended to be cooperation activities to be maintained during the project lifetime, allowing benefiting from the different developments carried out at the different projects and the possible existing synergies.

The dissemination strategy which has been followed during the first project period has been very focused on establishing and keeping a close contact with end users. On one hand, this has allowed the team to identify the needs that must be satisfied by PHAROS in the short and long term and which must be taken into account during the system design phase. On the other hand, the Consortium has been able to interact with end users, disseminating the project progress and motivating discussions and debates whose outcome has enriched the system design.

For the second project period, dissemination activities will be broadened, so that the  scientific community takes a more relevant role. Therefore, conferences and publications will be also targeted as suitable means to disseminate the scientific and technical works carried out within the project. In parallel, general dissemination events and dissemination activities focused on the end user perspective will still be part of the PHAROS dissemination strategy.