A partnership of excellence and a hi-tech project on the economy of the sea: this is how Genoa intends to become a reference point for innovation and technology transfer.
The city has presented its candidacy to be awarded one of the "Houses of emerging technologies": tangible and intangible infrastructures financed by the government, whose purpose is to support technology transfer to SMEs with the use of Blockchain, IoT and 'Artificial Intelligence and the creation of start-ups. It is a sort of incubator and driving force of innovation: the first "House of technologies" was launched in Matera last year, the public notice of the Ministry of Economic Development calls for a further 25 million euros for other projects .
The city of Genoa has presented a joint candidacy led by the Municipality of Genoa and which includes the excellence of the area in a public / private partnership that unites research centers, innovation poles and incubators: Job Center, University of Studies of Genoa, National Research Council, Italian Institute of Technologies, Tim, Digital Tree Innovation Habitat, the Ligurian Research and Innovation Centers "Innovative technologies for environmental control and sustainable development", "Ligurian district of marine technologies", "Systems intelligent integrated ".
The Genoa candidacy foresees the request to the Ministry for a loan of 5.3 million euros, to which 1.8 million euros of co-financing would be added, deriving from the resources made available by the subjects involved, for a total of 7 million euros. EUR.
The project involves the construction of a widespread model of Casa delle Tecnologie, which will have the nerve center of 5G infrastructure inside Palazzo Verde - Magazzini dellAbbondanza, already redeveloped by the Municipality, where the Genoa Blue District will also be born. But the project will be widespread because it also includes laboratories at the University of Genoa, at the IIT and outdoors in some parts of the city and the port in order to make prototypes and experiments on site. Each laboratory will have a specific theme, the headquarters at the Magazzini dell'Abbondanza will be a sort of "control room" of the entire system.
Biosensors and drones for environmental monitoring, innovative solutions for obtaining energy from the waves of the sea, intelligent buoys for the safety of terminal operations, augmented reality to make maintenance easier. These are just some of the possible applications that could arise from the House of Emerging Technologies in Genoa. The goal is to create a development opportunity on different dimensions in the context of the Blue Economy (port, industrial and administrative). The project of the House of Technologies envisages the creation of a workshop of excellence through which to experiment and implement technological innovations necessary to improve the performance of production processes, products and services. In this way the aim is to open new markets, to create new production synergies between SMEs and to increase the know-how of the territory. Through the most innovative technologies, the intention is to equip the port environment with sensors capable, among other things, of supporting timely monitoring of assets and their use also in terms of environmental impact and safety.Through artificial intelligence and big data it will be possible to ascertain potentially dangerous situations, make accurate and reliable forecasts of maintenance interventions, safely track goods. In all these applications, the capacity and speed of data transfer are fundamental, innovative features offered by 5G technology.
The municipal administration intends to enhance the heritage of the production chain linked to the sea, which includes research institutions, professional firms, large companies, SMEs and startups: the establishment, by the University of Genoa, of the Centro del mare and the launch of the Genoa Blue District constitute a concrete step towards the creation of a new physical and cultural space of the city of the Blue Economy.
