The second mobility mission of the European project REMOBILISE (of which NextMove is a partner) was held in Porto, Portugal, from May 10 to 12, 2023.

The mission and program were prepared and implemented by the automotive cluster MOBINOV - Cluster Automovél.

Numerous participants were on hand to discover the Portuguese ecosystem, in this mission aimed primarily at local authorities, to present them with a wide range of intelligent urban mobility solutions.

Day 1: Cities of the future, new opportunities, success stories

The packed program enabled participants to visit and meet a wide range of players:

The first day, held at the CEiiA engineering and product development center in Matosinhos, was devoted to presenting mobility concepts for the cities of the future, Portuguese innovation success stories and funding and collaboration opportunities.

EVIO presented its interoperable platform for managing the electric vehicle charging ecosystem, which ensures universal user access to charging stations regardless of operator.

CaetanoBus, a leading manufacturer of buses for various uses, presented its BEV and FCEV vehicles and made a comparison between the two, taking into account factors such as their cost, the infrastructure required and efficiency under different conditions.

Rangel Logistics Solutions, a logistics company with an international presence, explained the role of logistics in the sustainability of urban transport, as well as its fleet electrification projects and use of real-time algorithms for route optimization.

This was followed by a presentation of success stories: The SME Ubiwhere gave an update on its solutions and projects, including the Unicle platform and the demonstration of an autonomous bus in Aveiro, while AVL took the floor to explain its development, simulation and testing activities, particularly in the automotive field.

The Portuguese paradigm

Gonçalo Pacheco from MOBI.E, a public company supporting the transition to electric mobility, presented the Portuguese paradigm of public infrastructure management for electric mobility, which is considered a major success.

The system operates on the basis of the principles of freedom of choice of e-mobility service provider and freedom of access to any public access charging point. All information on the status of charging stations, whatever the provider, is available on an application and online. Interoperability is guaranteed even abroad, making it easy to roam between charging stations in different countries.

Finally, participants had the opportunity to discover Aveiro University's MSc Degree on Smart Mobility, as well as funding opportunities for public and private entities under the Horizon program.

After a tour of the spaces and development sites of the host venue, CEiiA, the day ended with a networking dinner.

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Day 2: Research, Development, Technology

The second day was devoted to visits to university centers and engineering and research laboratories in the Porto area and near the city of Guimarães.

At the INESCTEC (Institute of Systems and Computer Engineering, Technology and Science), the REMOBILISE delegation was able to discover the Institute's many areas of research, including telecommunications for smart cities, computer vision and artificial intelligence, mobility and urban logistics.

The delegation was then welcomed to Vila Nova de Gaia by the R&D company Capgemini Engineering, which presented its flagship projects, and by the Vortex CoLab laboratory, associated with Capgemini, where participants discovered several products and research in development.

The last visit of the day was to the CCG (Center for Technology and Innovation) in Guimarães, where, after a presentation of the center's main fields of research (data and geolocation for smart cities, urban mobility, autonomous mobility, etc.), participants were able to see and test simulations that had been set up.

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Day 3: Scenario - Building workshop

The mission's programme closed with a training session, given by Porto Business School, and divided in three parts: 1. The fundamentals of smart cities 2. Towards a smart city 3. The new age of urban mobility

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The REMOBILISE mission will be held in november 2023 and will explore the mobility ecosystem of Budapest, in Hungary. Stay up to date through the project's website or by directly contacting the NextMove team !