With ComVantage we envision an interorganisational collaboration space turning today's organisation-centric manufacturing approach into a product-centric one. Manufacturers will benefit from a flexible, efficient platform that helps them to operate as one virtual factory and thus gain competitive advantages in their markets. Based on best practises of Web 2.0 technologies the collaboration space will be an extension to existing business and engineering software. It will allow to share, administrate and monitor focused information throughout a product?s life cycle in a de-centralised manner. The close collaboration on the B2B and B2C levels will foster existing trends such as Open Innovation or Crowdsourcing.

The framework of the virtual factory will encompass a secure access control that is founded on dynamic workflow models and flexible user roles accounting for large enterprises, SMEs and for end-customers. It will enable temporary and de-centralised access management for ad-hoc collaboration between geographically distributed experts.

To adhere to changing working situations, to efficient communication, and to rich interaction technologies ComVantage will focus on mobile devices. Intuitive and trustful mobile apps shall support users in fast decision making and problem solving. Information from different sources across the organisations is provided and maintained via Linked Data. The integration of sensor data allows for products to be members of the collaboration space.

A continuous evaluation of the ICT and business model considering use cases throughout the project will verify the added-value of ComVantage for the European industry. The utilisation of existing technologies, a close user approach, and an incremental project set-up will provide sound concepts ready for fast productisation. Thus implementing ComVantage will increase lean communication, agile and highly efficient production processes, cost control and a low carbon footprint.

The research project is funded by the EC under FP7. The project consortium comprises SAP AG (Coordinator), Asociación de Empresas Tecnológicas Innovalia, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, BOC Business Objectives Consulting S.L.U, Comau S.p.A., Dresden University of Technology, Dresscode 21 GmbH, Evidian S.A., ISN Innovation Service Network d.o.o., Kölsch & Altmann GmbH, Nextel S.A., RST Industrie Automation GmbH, and University of Vienna.