Disrup­tive Tech­nolo­gies in the Public Sector

A partner in both the TG4Np and Improve Projects from ERNACT Ireland contacted us at the end of the 2014-2020 NPA funding period. Tradi­tion­ally, at the end of the funding period, extra money is distrib­uted, and now the oppor­tu­nity had come to get a research project funded about advanced technologies.

The reasons for co-oper­a­tion were based on Karelia’s good repu­ta­tion and activ­i­ties in previ­ous projects. ERNACT also called to action Umeå Univer­sity. Accord­ing to the orig­i­nal deci­sion, the project was due to start on 1 April 2020, but due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the start was post­poned to 1 October 2020. The project ended March 31, 2022.

The DISTINCT Project (Disrup­tive Tech­nolo­gies Trans­form­ing North­ern Periph­ery and Arctic Commu­ni­ties) was led by the ERNACT network (Ireland), which coor­di­nated activ­i­ties with the other two part­ners: Karelia Univer­sity of Applied Sciences (Finland) and Umeå Univer­sity (Sweden). The project had a dura­tion of 18 months.

The Distinct Project

The DISTINCT Project explored the prac­ti­cal appli­ca­tion of Disrup­tive Tech­nolo­gies in the public service provi­sion. This includes the use of Virtual Reality (VR), Inter­net of Things (IoT), Arti­fi­cial Intel­li­gence (AI) and Blockchain in health and social care, envi­ron­men­tal manage­ment and training.

Disrup­tive tech­nol­ogy is an inno­va­tion that signif­i­cantly alters the way that consumers, indus­tries, or busi­nesses operate. A disrup­tive tech­nol­ogy sweeps away the systems or habits it replaces because it has attrib­utes that are recog­niz­ably superior.

The reason disrup­tive tech­nolo­gies are impor­tant, is because the success­ful appli­ca­tion can save costs, increase viabil­ity, improve use of scarce human resources, span distances and improve deci­sion making. However, the small number and concen­tra­tion of disrup­tive tech­nol­ogy research and inno­va­tion centers, allied with low levels of aware­ness, present serious blocks to real­iz­ing this improvement.

The DISTINCT Project focused on the follow­ing technologies:

• Inter­net of Things (IoT): describes the network of small phys­i­cal objects, that are packed with sensors, soft­ware, and other tech­nolo­gies to connect and exchange data with other devices and systems over the internet.

• Arti­fi­cial Intel­li­gence (AI): describes soft­ware, machines, comput­ers or devices that can mimic func­tions of the human mind such as learn­ing, perceiv­ing their envi­ron­ment, solving a problem or success­fully achiev­ing goals.

• Virtual Reality (VR): use of special headsets/devices to gener­ate real­is­tic images, sounds and other sensa­tions that simu­late a user’s phys­i­cal pres­ence in a virtual envi­ron­ment. The user is able to look and move around and inter­act with virtual objects.

• Augmented Reality (AR): inter­ac­tive expe­ri­ence of a real-world envi­ron­ment where the objects that reside in the real world are enhanced by computer-gener­ated percep­tual infor­ma­tion, some­times across multi­ple sensory modalities.

• Blockchain: Blockchain is a growing distrib­uted list of data records, called blocks, linked using cryp­tog­ra­phy. It is resis­tant to modi­fi­ca­tion and can record trans­ac­tions between two parties effi­ciently and in a veri­fi­able and perma­nent way.

What We Did in the Distinct Project

Part­ners worked together to jointly achieve the project’s main result: three North­ern Periph­ery and Arctic regions with signif­i­cantly enhanced capac­ity to deliver future-proof viable public services using disrup­tive tech­nolo­gies as a result of increased aware­ness, prepared­ness and inno­va­tion planning.

  1. Public Sector Fore­sight Analysis

The questionnaire’s inten­tion is to increase aware­ness among public author­i­ties by discov­er­ing appli­ca­tions and esti­mat­ing poten­tial demand, of how partic­u­lar disrup­tive tech­nolo­gies can be applied to partic­u­lar public services in remote and sparsely popu­lated areas.

A total of 45 total responses were gath­ered through the online ques­tion­naire from differ­ent NPA coun­tries. Responses came from Finland, Ireland, North­ern Ireland, Scot­land, Iceland, Norway and Sweden.

Link to Fore­sight Analy­sis Report.

  • NPA Disrup­tive Tech­nolo­gies Capac­ity Eval­u­a­tion Report

The purpose of the docu­ment is to assess the exist­ing disrup­tive tech­nolo­gies capac­i­ties avail­able in the NPA region.

It is the result of the process followed by the DISTINCT part­ners which have included desk research, consul­ta­tions and inter­views with target groups that in this case are the research centers, univer­si­ties, colleges and compa­nies, owners of the know-how on disrup­tive tech­nolo­gies solutions.

The iden­ti­fi­ca­tion process has focused in the poten­tial appli­ca­tion of disrup­tive tech­nolo­gies, in partic­u­lar Inter­net of Things (IoT), Arti­fi­cial Intel­li­gence (AI), Virtual Reality/Augmented Reality (VR/AR) and Blockchain, into the public service areas addressed in the project, namely, health and care, envi­ron­men­tal manage­ment and training.

Link to the Capac­ity Eval­u­a­tion Report.

  • DISTINCT Disrup­tive Tuesdays

The Disrup­tive Tues­days was a series of workshops/demo sessions where several exam­ples were show­cased provid­ing atten­dees with a better idea of the role that these tech­nolo­gies can play for improved public services. In total, three sessions were organized:

  1. Use of Disrup­tive Tech­nolo­gies in Envi­ron­men­tal Manage­ment, 16 Novem­ber 2021 –
  2. Use of Disrup­tive Tech­nolo­gies in Health and Social Care, 7 Decem­ber 2021 (Hosted by Karelia –
  3. Use of Disrup­tive Tech­nolo­gies in Educa­tion and Train­ing, 25 January 2022

These online sessions were recorded and can be accessed here.

  • Imple­men­ta­tion Roadmap

The recom­men­da­tions and best prac­tices proposed in this roadmap, targeted to orga­ni­za­tions respon­si­ble of public services, makes use of the find­ings from the work done by the DISTINCT part­ner­ship in previ­ous project activ­i­ties. The roadmap will be published on the project website at a later date. The roadmap can be found after publi­ca­tion here.

Authors:

Timo Rui, Senior Project Manager, Karelia UAS

Riikka Räsänen, Project Special­ist, Karelia UAS

Cover photo: Tara Winstead