BMVBS_TransKoop

TransKoop: Transfer of Cooperative Organisation Concepts and Technologies Exemplified by the Children’s Media Sector

Description

The project TransKoop of the Computer-Supported Cooperative Work Group at the Bauhaus-University Weimar, Germany, aims at transferring jointly created and innovative organisation concepts and technologies into children’s media companies in Thuringia, Germany. Based on a mutual exchange of industry and academia, there are advantages for both sides: on the one hand the partners from industry become familiar with new concepts and technologies of cooperative work allowing to optimise their cooperation processes; on the other hand the Computer-Supported Cooperative Work Group as partner from academia get valuable insight on requirements for and the use of concepts and technologies with the aim to further optimise them.

Approach

The project TransKoop develops—in cooperation with all participating enterprises—innovative concepts and systems to support setting up networks as well as effective and efficient cooperation between distributed small and medium enterprises. The interdisciplinary team elaborates psychological, social, and technical requirements and techniques for computer-supported social interaction, coordination, and cooperation to help the small and medium enterprises to operate successfully on the market as a virtual enterprise. The participants of the TransKoop project benefit from consulting in Computer-Supported Cooperative Work, Ubiquitous Computing, and Web 2.0. The collaboration on generic concepts and technologies as well as customised solutions for cooperative work for children’s media companies generates synergy effects for the development of innovative cooperative environments for small and medium virtual organisations. These concepts include novel sensor and actuator technologies as well as Ubiquitous Computing for a flexible support of social interaction.

Activities

• Requirements analysis for small and medium children’s media companies
• Consulting of concepts and technologies of Computer-Supported Cooperative Work and Web 2.0
• Development of customised solutions for cooperative environments
• Organisation of workshops and conferences
• Documentation and implementation of the insights and requirements from industry for new models, concepts, and tools for cooperative work

Current State and Results

The project TransKoop has performed a requirements analysis. The analysis of the secondary market compares the situation of children’s media companies and existing organisation technologies in Germany with the situation in Thuringia is completed. In the subsequent empirical study small and medium enterprises were contacted through the KinderMedienZentrum Erfurt as well as through direct contact. For the involved small and medium enterprises, the project Web pages provide a short questionnaire for a preliminary analysis on the use of and knowledge on existing systems for communication, coordination, and cooperation. At the same time, the project TransKoop organised conferences and workshops providing a forum for a first personal contact among interested enterprises as well as the TransKoop team and leading to interest on concepts and tools for cooperative work.

An overview of the TransWerk - The TransKoop Software Suite can be found here.

Partners

With the KinderMedienZentrum Erfurt, TransKoop holds a valuable contact to an important multiplier. The KinderMedienZentrum concentrates competencies for the children’s media companies providing office and studio space as well as technical equipment. The scientific partner of the project is the Computer-Supported Cooperative Work Group and its Cooperative Media Lab (CML). This CML develops conceptual solutions for classical and innovative forms of organisation and technology for user-centred Groupware, Social Software, and Ubiquitous Computing.

People

Tom Gross, Principle Investigator
Dennis Braunsdorf, Researcher
Maxi Hucke, Researcher

Christoph Beckmann, Associate Researcher
Mirko Fetter, Associate Researcher
Ferdinand Kastl, Associate Researcher
Maximilian Schirmer, Associate Researcher

Funding

The project is partly funded by the Federal Ministry of the Interior and by the Project Management Jülich; the funding period is Oct. 2008 to June 2011

Further Information

• TransWerk - The TransKoop Software Suite; in English
• Project web pages in German
• Web page of the innovation contest "Wirtschaft trifft Wissenschaft" ("Industry Meets Academia"; in German)