TransiT - investigating SME co-operation across borders in Europe

Oliver Stiemerling, Volker Wulf, Armin B.

Cremers
University of Bonn
Christine Buelens, Gert Boulliard
University of Leuven, METALogic
Martin Maidhof, Ralph Peters
Fraunhofer IGD, Darmstadt
Clive Bancroft
University of Coventry
Francis Fricker, Charles Durand
ADEBT: Belfort Economic Development
Agency / University of Technology of
Belfort-Montbeliard
Abstract
TRANSIT investigates the current challenges and
potential of computer supported transnational cooperation
of small and medium size engineering firms in
Europe. The project is an international initiative supported
by the European Social Fund's ADAPT program and
involves Universities and private companies in the UK,
Belgium, and Germany. The partners from each country
are in turn involved in national ADAPT projects which
benefit from the experiences made on the transnational
level. The project started in January 98 and will end in
December 99. In this article we describe the TRANSIT
approach to the investigation of transnational SME-cooperation
and present findings to date.
Introduction
To ensure survival in highly competitive global markets
small and medium sized enterprises are actively seeking
innovative ways to do business, expand customer base and
increase profitability. Within Europe the common market,
a trend towards a common currency and the need for ever
greater profitability is encouraging small and medium
sized enterprises (SMEs) into transnational trading and
hence closer transnational co-operation. In the past all
organisations following this route of expansion where
faced with the significant investment of setting up a local
support agent in a foreign city or the frequent travelling of
a valued human resource to the specific country.
Today the IT revolution has led to an alternative solution
for conducting transnational business in an efficient and
productive way, computer supported tele-co-operation. Up
to now tele-co-operation has been the domain of large
international organisations. However, the advent of
inexpensive mass-products in this area and the increasing
availability of standardised communication links and the
Intemet have opened up the world of tele-co-operation to
SMEs. Consequently, there is now a need to introduce this
new technology along with its significant opportunities
and challenges to SMEs and their employees. This is an
objective of the TRANSIT project.
The TRANSIT project consortium is formed by three
national ADAPT funded projects. The ORGTECH project
(University of Bonn, Fraunhofer IGD, and three other
partners) is concerned with the introduction of a tele-cooperation
system in two small engineering firms and one
of their customers, a large steel mill. The Coventry
University based REFIT project promotes the use of
knowledge based engineering methodologies in SMEs in
the British foundry industry. The University of Leuven
works with local SMEs in the TECHNICUM project
which aims at paving the way for state-of-the-art
metallurgical services accessed via the Intemet. ADEBT
is in charge of assisting SMEs in the creation of new
products by companies that are mostly geared towards
subcontracting business from large industrial
organisations.
The transnational work comprises of two main phases.
Phase 1 the design of a transnational tele-co-operation
system. Phase 2 the demonstration and dissemination of
results.
In phase one, the technical infrastructure for the tele-cooperation
system will be set-up, configured, and evaluated
against the needs and financial, technical, and personal
resources of the SMEs involved in the domestic projects.
The challenge of this phase is to design a system that will
be both usable and affordable by SMEs, beyond the life of
the project TransiT.
SIGGROUP Bulletin August 1998/Vol 19, No.2 35