SIXFOLD

SIXFOLD means Stimulating Innovation eXperiments in Food prOcessing Live Demonstrators. This European project aims to develop a strong interconnected network of Living Labs with programs for agri-food companies and high-tech suppliers to remove barriers for implementation of innovative technologies. In this way Living Labs contribute to the acceleration of the digital, sustainable and resilient transition of the food industry.

Why this project?

SIXFOLD has the ambition to stimulate the twin transition in the agri-food industry in Europe. Building a dynamic and regionally embedded ecosystem of Living Labs across the EU will thrive deep tech innovations relevant for the agri-food industry. Focus is addressing barriers for deep tech innovations experienced by agri-food companies.

The implementation of deep tech such as AI and machine learning, robots and co-bots, biotech, etc. encounter different implementation needs in the food industry.

Making these needs (barrier-cases) visible within the European network of living labs and defining together solutions for innovators and regulators will accelerate the implementation of these deep tech innovations and speed up the digital and green (Twin) transition in Europe.

Research approach and expected results

Concrete expected results of the European project - EIE (European Innovation Ecosystem) SIXFOLD are:

Enlarge and increase the network of regional embedded Living Labs with specific focus on the implementation of innovative solutions for fostering deep tech innovators and regulators.
Develop, exchange and scale up "best practices" and guidelines to stimulate the implementation of deep tech innovations in the agri-food industry.
Through study visits in different regional ecosystems and through complementarity with other living labs dissemination of disruptive technologies will be simplified.
To make the network of regional embedded living labs sustainable and to guarantee the implication of relevant stakeholders a governance model based on “hands-on” action plan of the network of Living labs will be made.

Target group

The results of the project are relevant to the entire food industry.

Project partners

Flanders' FOOD is one of the 6 partners of the SIXFOLD consortium that is made of SeAMK, AFC, AFT, ITG en TH OWL. These partners collaborate also in SS4AF and HIGHFIVE. The partners represent different actors within the quadruple helix ecosystem.

Seinäjoki University of Applied Sciences (SeAMK, Finland): Markus.Ojala@seamk.fi (project coordinator)
AgriFood Capital (AFC, The Netherlands): s.maas@agrifoodcapital.nl
AgriFood Lithuania (AFL, Lithuania): rasa@agrifood.lt
Instituto Tecnológico de Galicia (ITG, Spain: lnaveira@itg.es
Technische Hochshule Ostwestfalen-Lippe (TH OWL, Germany): nele.jantz@th-owl.de