CEI-Sphere

Brief Description

The CEI-Sphere project is a continuation of UNLOCK-CEI and is part of the broader EUCloudEdgeIoT community, dedicated to supporting the building of a European Cloud-Edge-IoT computing continuum. CEI-Sphere aims to support the development of an open, interoperable, and competitive ecosystem encompassing the Cloud-Edge-IoT Large-Scale Pilots (LSPs), especially those funded under the HORIZON-CL4-2024-DATA-01-03 call. 

The project focuses on gaining a detailed understanding of use cases, value chains, and markets, promoting interoperability, and ensuring the scalability and robustness of cloud-edge solutions, also through the contribution to international standards. CEI-Sphere’s approach will be to identify, together with the LSPs, key “spheres”, i.e. continuous engagement environments around the most crucial industries the pilots will focus on, aligning with initiatives such as the European Data Strategy, the Important Project of Common European Interest on Next Generation Cloud Infrastructure and Services (IPCEI-CIS)  and Next Generation Internet (NGI).

Our Role

As a key partner in CEI-Sphere, Trust-IT is leading the communication, dissemination, and engagement efforts of the project to maximise the visibility and impact of project results. This includes creating user-friendly content to disseminate the results across various communication channels, such as reports with market analysis insights, guidelines on technologies, and success stories from the project's use cases. 

One of the key outputs from our work package is a customised visualisation tool to guide users through the pilot’s use cases and their innovative ecosystem. Trust-IT is also responsible for managing community engagement activities, ensuring strong connections with key stakeholders across Europe, including technology providers, policy makers, and industry associations that will be invited to participate in the LSPs via dedicated open calls. Finally, Trust-IT leads the task on events management, including standardisation-oriented events to support the pilots in their standardisation needs. 

Impact

The CEI-Sphere project is expected to boost the adoption of next-generation cloud-edge technologies, contributing to the competitiveness and sustainability of European industries. By promoting energy-efficient and secure solutions, CEI-Sphere also supports the EU's digital and green transformation goals. 

The project enhances interoperability, helping bridge the gap between innovation and large-scale deployment across sectors like energy, mobility, agriculture and more. Furthermore, building on the synergies with the EUCloudEdgeIoT cluster, it ensures that the knowledge and insights generated by these initiatives will be widely disseminated and re-used, maximising its impact on the European digital landscape.

Results

CEI-Sphere will deliver several key results, including a high-level CEI reference architecture, a comprehensive use-case catalogue, market analysis reports, and guidelines for the tech backbone of the pilots. Additionally, the project will produce an innovation ecosystem visualisation tool and establish a certification framework to ensure the long-term scalability and success of cloud-edge infrastructure in Europe