Management structure and procedures

4D Hybrid will be based on a management structure, reflecting the project context and the number of partners, to ensure an efficient management/coordination and to make sure that all project objectives are achieved within planned time, cost and quality. The project management/coordination will rely on procedures and techniques that have been successfully agreed by the 4D Hybrid partners. The structure will follow a hierarchical approach. To assure a lean and efficient management of the project, WP1 will be dedicated to project co-ordination and management comprising the following aspects:

  • organizing and managing the project activities as a whole, carrying out all the scientific, technical and administrative tasks;
  • supervising the project developments and monitoring the technical achievements, including the IPR management issues;
  • ensuring communication among the project partners and with the commission;
  • securing industrial results through a specific exploitation program;
  • guaranteeing that grant agreement duties and European Commission (EC) expectations are met on time, consistent with expected quality, and within the negotiated cost structure.

In order to fulfil such tasks, a structure and organization of the Consortium is proposed to properly coordinate all the planned activities from a technical and administrative point of view, considering the interests of all the partners involved in the project and those of the external environment. Simple and effective procedures will be set up in order to reduce the complexity of interactions and project overhead, so to simplify the work of the management for all partners and increase the efficiency and quality of the work carried out in the 4D Hybrid. In this section, the proposed project management procedures that implement the mentioned principles are identified and described. The description of these procedures includes the management structure and organization, quality control procedures and Intellectual Property Rights strategy.

To rationalize responsibilities, duties and interaction between partners, a Consortium Agreement will be defined and signed before the start-up of the RTD activities. The purpose of this Consortium Agreement will aim to:

  • specify the organization of the work between the Parties;
  • organize the management of the Research Program;
  • define an IPR management strategy (background and foreground);
  • define the rights and obligations of the Parties, including, but not limited to, their liability and indemnification;
  • supplement the provisions of the EU Contract concerning Access Rights;
  • ensure the gender equality;
  • set out rights and obligations of the Parties supplementing but not conflicting with those of the EU Contract.

The management of the project will be structured in three major layers. The basis of the management structure is performed by the leaders of the work-packages who are responsible for the work-package scientific and technical quality and related deadlines. All the work-package leaders constitute the second layer of the management, i.e. the Scientific and Technical Committee (STC) led by the STC coordinator. The STC coordinator together with the industrial coordinator will refer to the Scientific and Industrial Quality Coordinator (SIQC) of the project who, in turn, is asked to directly relate to the Project Coordinator. These players will constitute the last management layer – the highest one – which is the Steering Committee (SC). The SC will then interact with the General Assembly of the project composed of all the partners of the consortium that represents the highest level of decision making within the project and will decide the overall project strategy. The SC will be also responsible for constituting a constant bridge with the EC. Figure 32 illustrates the management architecture across the three major layers.

As it will be outlined in the following part of the current section, all 4D Partners will be involved in the management process with roles pertaining to their specific core activities. LEs and SMEs will actively participate to the project decision process by leading most of the work-packages and high decision roles within the Steering Committee.

Steering Committee (SC)
The highest-level authority of the project will be the Project Steering Committee (SC), formally empowered to take binding decisions. It will be in charge of implementing the strategy approved by consortium members and for managing operations.
In order to guarantee the industrial guidance and decision power, as well as to ensure continuous monitoring over major project developments, SC will include:

  • Project Coordinator (PC) and Scientific and Industrial Quality Coordinator (SIQC).
  • Industrial coordinator (IC) mainly representing IPR and exploitation interests, to ensure industrial guidance.
  • Scientific and Technical Coordinator (STC).

Decisions in the Steering Committee will be taken at the majority, the Project Coordinator having a deciding vote. EC representative will be invited to attend all meetings of the SC with no voting rights.
In particular, the SC will take decisions on the following issues:

  • Administrative, technical and consortium issues.
  • Meetings, reports, approval of deliverables.
  • Financial and Knowledge management as well as assessment and approval of the technical deliverables.
  • Communication internally and with STC and Industrial Coordinator IC.
  • Implementation of the project and evolution/evaluation of implementation plan.
  • Report on consortium problems and IPR issues.
  • Communication (web-based platform), report on changes in decision.
  • Making structures and conflict resolution.
  • Exploitation and dissemination activities.
  • Exploiting and monitoring the strategies to manage the project risks and challenges.

Partners and people appointed for participation to the SC are listed below:

PartnerAppointed person
PEPaolo Calefati
3D-NTFabio Ferrario
IRISManuel Lai
SUPSIAnna Valente

The SC is composed by four major figures: the Project Coordinator, the Scientific and Industrial Quality Coordinator, the Scientific and Technical Coordinator and the Industrial Coordinator.

The Project Coordinator will be responsible for the correct execution of the entire research program, communication among partners and between the Consortium and the European Commission. The Project Coordinator will also be liable for global project management (planning, implementation and control of all project activities), coordination of the overall project, administrative and financial aspects and reporting of project financial and budgetary status to the Steering Committee. 4D Hybrid Coordinator will be Eng. Paolo Calefati (PE).

The 4D Hybrid concurrently addresses very challenging scientific and technological objectives as well as the need to realize industrial demonstrators in running industrial environment. As a result, it is particularly instrumental to merge the scientific and industrial development processes in a way the results embrace promising market opportunities. This complex task is globally managed by the Scientific and Industrial Quality Coordinator (SIQC) with the following responsibility:

  • Ensure coherence between RTD activities and the industrial objectives.
  • Monitor the quality of the project outcomes and their technology transferability in the market.
  • Develop the recovery strategies if the quality of project results is defaulting or not aligned with the objectives.
  • Report on activities progress of the project to the Project Coordinator and to the Consortium.

The SIQC responds to the Project Coordinator – being the reference person reporting on the scientific and industrial quality status of the works – and participates to the SC. The person in charge will be dr. Eng. Manuel Lai (IRIS).

The STC coordinator will be the reference person representing the STC. Principal responsibilities of scientific and technical coordinator will be as follows:

  • Co-ordinate the activities of all the technological research directions foreseen for developing 4D applications.
  • Synchronize and integrate the results achieved in each technological area.
  • Call together, chair and monitor STC along with monitoring all development plans.
  • Report on scientific and technical progress of the project to the SIQC and to the Consortium.

The STC coordinator responds to the SIQC, leads the STC and participates to the SC. The person in charge will be Dr. Eng. Anna Valente (SUPSI).

The last fundamental party in the SC is the Industrial Coordinator (IC), whose main responsibilities will be:

  • Co-ordinate the activities of all industrial partners;
  • Synchronize with SIQC, acting as a representative for the industry in everyday management
  • Act as Exploitation Manager, to coordinate and monitor the exploitation of results.

The IC responds to the SIQC and participates to the SC. Eng. Fabio Ferrario (3D-NT) will play the role of IC.

The Industrial Coordinator will be responsible for the Industrial Representatives (IR) cluster, whose main tasks will be:

  • Co-ordinate the activities of all industrial partners;
  • Synchronize with PC and STC, acting as a representative for the industry in everyday management.
  • Coordinate and monitor the exploitation of results.

Scientific and Technical Committee (STC)
The SC will jointly interact with the Scientific and Technical Committee responsible for the scientific and technical direction of the project. The STC is composed by WP leaders of each research chapter. Each member of STC will be responsible for the work and the results achieved under its research direction. The STC will be in charge of implementing the technical development strategy and control that the interim results achieved are in line with the project final output and deadlines.

For further information, communications and dissemination proposals and request of collaboration please contact [email protected].

  • Organization
  • PE
  • 3D-NT
  • UoB
  • LMS
  • SUPSI
  • Framos
  • MCI
  • Appointed person
  • Paolo Calefati
  • Fabio Ferrario
  • Moataz Attallah
  • Panos Stavropoulos
  • Anna Valente
  • Dietmar Scharf
  • Giorgio Magistrelli
  • Role in the project
  • WP1, 6 leader
  • WP4 leader
  • WP3 leader
  • WP2 leader
  • WP7, 8, 9 leader
  • WP5 leader
  • WP10 leader