NCSR from Greece posted this pre-check to me on 17.7.08. I met Stelios on 10.7.in Athens.
The project addresses visionary impairments (which is a chronic condition) of elderly people and wants to explore on touch-based interaction (and also audio) to overcome this hurdle.

The project addresses a clear societal challenge, however, the full project is presented in a "technology push" manner. The wording "suggests" a priority on research rather than development.  Almost nothing is said so far how the users are involved in the process and how the project prepares the acceptance of touch panels devices by the elderly people. It must be emphasised that prevention and management of chronic conditions is the call topic. This context is not well represented at the moment - instead, the project wants to examine two contexts at home and for public transportation - the latter does not seem to fit.

A number of commercial partners are represented in the consortium  - this is good but not all should come from one country. 12 partners is ambitious and eventually difficult to manage. One end user organisation is a must.

Michael Huch

Answer from Stelios
Dear Michael,

Thank you very much for your well pointed and accurate feedback. I find it very insightful and helpful in improving the presentation of the proposal. Reducing the size of the consortium might be an issue, as we are planning to have end users from Finland, Spain and Greece involved in three separate pilots, following a modular approach in the development of the "end product." In regards to the "technological push," I agree that the way the proposal is written doesn't do justice to the intent of the Consortium which is to have a fully functional and ready to market prototype at the end of the project. We'll do our best to make this clear in the proposal.

Thanks again for reviewing our proposal idea and your thorough comments.

Best regards and have a nice vacation,
Dr. Stelios C. A. Thomopoulos, Ph.D.
Director of Research - Associate Institute Director & former Professor of EE

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