Software-Cluster Creates the Infrastructure for Launching the Business Software of Tomorrow

The aim of the cooperation of 32 partners from industry and research is to create an infrastructure for the launch of business software services in the cloud that can be combined in new ways. The project is the last of four projects starting within the Software-Cluster that receive funding via the Leading-Edge Cluster Competition of the German Federal Government.

The joint project “Software Innovations for the Digital Company” (SINNODIUM) builds on the three ongoing projects within the framework of the Leading-Edge Cluster Competition, connects the various fields of research, and guides the overall project to an integrated conclusion. In practice, initial prototype solutions for the next generation of business software—“emergent software”—are developed that dynamically and flexibly work to make a variety of components from different manufacturers combinable, thus triggering a wave of innovation in digital companies across all sectors.

Within SINNODIUM, medium and large software companies therefore work together with research partners on general application scenarios for emergent business software in the areas of Smart Retail (trade), Smart Production (industry), and Smart Services (services and logistics).

The basis for this are platforms provided by the participating large companies as an infrastructure and development environment. Furthermore, small and medium software companies in the Software-Cluster and beyond will be capable of developing emergent software components, services, and tools for highly individualized business processes and marketing them internationally.

“The big German producers of enterprise software cooperate in the Software Cluster with innovative, specialized software houses,” said Dr. Wolfram Jost, CTO, Software AG. “The prototypical mutual ecosystem developed here is beneficial for each individual participant as well as for the future of the German software industry.”

The following Software-Cluster partners are involved in the project “Software Innovations for the Digital Company:” CAS Software AG, CyberForum e.V., DFKI Innovative Retail Laboratory , Empolis Information Management GmbH, Eyeled GmbH, Fraunhofer Institute for Experimental Software Engineering (IESE), Fraunhofer Institute for Industrial Mathematics (ITWM), German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence (DFKI), House of IT e.V., IHK Darmstadt Service GmbH, imc information multimedia communication AG, Insiders Technologies GmbH, intelligent views gmbh, John Deere European Technology Innovation Center, KOBIL Systems GmbH, Kompetenzzentrum Informatik Saarland, mineway GmbH, proALPHA Software AG, SAP AG, Scheer Group GmbH, Scheer Management GmbH, SIEDA GmbH, Sirrix AG security technologies, SmartFactoryKL e.V., Software AG, Software Technologie Initiative Kaiserslautern e.V., Start-up Office of TU & FH Kaiserslautern, Technische Universität Darmstadt, Technische Universität Kaiserslautern, Universität des Saarlandes, Urban Software Institute GmbH & Co. KG, vwd Vereinigte Wirtschaftsdienste AG.

The Software-Cluster projects “Foundations of Emergent Software” and “Process Innovations in the Software Industry” have been ongoing since 2010 and the project “Innovative Services in the Internet of the Future” since 2011. The foundations of “emergent software,” a new class of distributed, innovative information systems that emerge across companies through the interaction of individual components and services on the Internet, thus exhibiting a qualitatively higher performance, are being developed in these projects. The project “Process Innovations in the Software Industry” aims to promote the competitiveness of software companies through the development of business methods for the management of innovation projects. The findings from both projects form the basis for the corresponding research and development in the project “Innovative Services in the Internet of the Future” which researches and tests the sales of enterprise software services in the cloud.