European Telework Information Day Brussels - 28th May 1998 Report By Jeremy Millard ETD Programme Manager

The Fifth Framework Programme: New Ways to Work and Electronic Commerce

Mr Arentoft is a member of the joint DGXIII and DGIII team presently putting together a work programme to implement the proposed second key action on new ways to work and electronic commerce as part of the plans for research under the Fifth Framework Programme on Information Society Technologies.

Michael Arentoft explained that the present status of the work programme is as a proposal currently on its way through the Council and Parliament. The Information Society Technologies programme is one part of the Fifth Framework Programme for Research and Technology Development (RTD), and is itself broken down into four key actions, one of which is New Ways of Working and Electronic Commerce. This key action can expect to have a budget of about 500 MECU over the next four years for supporting shared cost projects, in which the Commission would finance 50% of the work. Compared to the Structural Funds, this is a relatively small resource representing only about 4% of the EU budget.

If the present proposal gets a relatively smooth passage through Council and Parliament, the first call for proposals can be expected to take place at the end of 1998 with the first projects starting in the summer of 1999. Much emphasis will be placed upon projects which are able to share and communicate widely and to develop IST solutions which can build communities, including learning communities (or communities of practice), and communities of product design and delivery. These are communities which can respond flexibly to new market conditions and dynamics, typically made up of SMEs and virtual enterprises, where individual human factors coupled with external links and processes, especially those close to the customer, are at least as important as the internal processes of individual organisations.

The rationale for the current proposed work programme is based upon both socio-economic and technical issues. Today, more than 70% of office workers use a PC, and about 4 2 million people in Europe already “telework” for part of the week. According to one industry estimate, goods and services worth approximately 4 billion ECU were traded electronically in 1996 and this figure is expected to rise to 200 billion ECU by the year 2000. Information society technologies are radically transforming the way people work, the way organisations operate and the way that consumers undertake purchases. Despite these dramatic changes, we are only at the beginning, continued technological development and take-up is needed to enable new ways of working and conducting business that enable Europe to be competitive in the global marketplace, and which improve the quality of working life and provide increased confidence for consumers.

With the Internet growing at over 60% per year, new business opportunities are continuously emerging for electronic commerce, with lower costs, wider markets and more choice for consumers. Particularly for SMEs and individual entrepreneurs, for whom electronic commerce provides the possibility for affordable channels to the global marketplace. It is vital for all Europe's businesses that the new marketplaces are open, accommodate European business practices, internationally interoperable and reliable. However, the enabling technologies continue to evolve very rapidly. European research and technology development is essential to the coherence of and confidence in these new marketplaces in Europe.

Consumers and businesses must both have confidence in the integrity of information and services; confidence to publish material without suffering from IPR piracy; confidence that their right to privacy be respected and personal data will not be abused, and confidence in the security of electronic payment systems. New models of “best practice” need to be established. Research and technology development is essential to the preservation of consumer protection and for trust and in new methods of work and electronic commerce.

The aim of the New Ways to Work and Electronic Commerce key action would be to enable European workers and enterprises, in particular SMEs, to increase their competitiveness in the global marketplace, whilst at the same time improving the quality of the individual's working life, through the use of information society technologies to provide the flexibility to be free both from many existing constraints on working methods and organisation, including those imposed by distance and time. It would cover both the development and the trading of goods and services, in particular in the electronic marketplace, and take into account the different requirements of the individual worker, consumer and of businesses and organisations. Considerations of the global context and socio-economic factors would guide the work in this action, and the objective would be to develop and demonstrate world-best work and business practices, exploiting European strengths such as electronic payments, smart cards, mobile systems, software for business process modelling and enterprise management and consumer protection.

Three main areas will be looked at in the key action:

Flexible, mobile and remote working methods and tools Work would focus on enabling, validating and demonstrating competitive, flexible and human-centred work methods and business organisation, by means of an integrated approach to the combination of business process and work organisation, human resource management, and information society technologies, informed by socio-economic and legal requirements analysis and considerations of the global context and actual business practice. It would address the needs of workers, enterprises and consumers alike. Best-practice pilots and scaleable demonstrations, together with dissemination actions to stimulate broad experimentation and adoption would be major features of the work.

RTD priorities are:

organisation: integrating new or re-engineered work methods, structures and electronic commerce in all sectors, including administrations, taking into account existing practices; agile, extended, virtual enterprises and networks of individuals; integration of the value chain, including workflow management

socio-economic issues: (including the necessary statistical methods and tools); analysis of change; organisational methodologies, including benchmarking, scenario planning, transformation methods and change and risk management; human resources and training; human factors, usability and ergonomics for workers and consumers; the legal and regulatory framework, including consumer protection.

Management systems for suppliers and consumers Work would focus on seamless end-to-end support, covering both tangible and intangible products, for electronic trading and distributed virtual enterprises and marketplaces. It would cover applications or systems for interactions within and between consumers, individual entrepreneurs, businesses and administrations. It would address both business and work processes covering the full value chain and the information society technologies needed to support them.

RTD priorities are information society technologies systems to address: processes in development, including: life-cycle support, design, engineering and maintenance, logistics and distribution management, quality control, productivity measurement processes in marketing and sales, including: customer interaction, negotiation and contracting, mass customisation, packaging and trading processes in financial services, integrating where appropriate support for the EURO, including: ordering, billing and payment, accounting and taxation; public and private procurement processes in management, including: decision support and planning; virtual and real marketplace management systems; personnel management; systems for on-line business information search and management, including directories and catalogues and multimedia digital assistants.

Information security Work would focus on technologies to boost trust and confidence in the information infrastructure, and in its services and information resources, as being reliable, efficient and user-friendly for new methods of work and doing business. This includes protecting information integrity, managing intellectual property rights and enhancing privacy.

RTD priorities are:

take-up: concertation for ensuring interoperability and contributing to internationally recognised standards

In thanking Mr. Arentoft's for his briefing, Mr. Johnston stressed that the Commission still very much welcomes the wide input of ideas and suggestions into this work programme as it is essential to make this a truly cooperative European venture. This will enable the Commission to channel investments into areas where the technologies developed over the next few years can optimise the opportunities for new work and for world trade in electronic commerce, particularly for the small business community. Inter-operability and open access is extremely important in this context, and this is especially critical for SMEs which have greater problems than the larger companies and multi-nationals.