Editorial

Dear ITEA Community,

Preparing the future is only possible by understanding the roots.

Solving a problem with a permanent solution can only be achieved by finding its root cause.
Defining the formula of a success is only possible by investigating the roots where it stands.
Creating impactful results is only possible by achieving outcomes that improve lives.

While celebrating 25 years of ITEA, we are diving into the deepest roots of ITEA to understand how it was established so that we may continue its success in the future by following the footsteps of predecessors and continuously adapting these steps to new conditions. And it has been a joyful and instructive journey.

In this magazine, you will find an interview with Wilbert Schaap, the Public Authority of the Netherlands for ITEA and one of the initiators of the ITEA Community, and with Ayda Kara Pektas, Public Authority of Türkiye, a relatively new member of the ITEA Public Authorities Committee. This gives a perspective on what the roots are and how things have evolved over time. The common denominators are continuously successful results, enthusiasm and trust.

It is also very important how ITEA has been human-centric while being a software innovation community. Creating happiness has been an ambition since ITEA 3 and, in ITEA 4, sustainability has been added as a new ambition when it comes to finding solutions to the urgent needs of today. In the Project benefits story of the HekDisco project and the Success stories of PARTNER and VMAP, the impacts for the end-users are shared. And the Community Talk with Gjalt Loots shows the happiness shared by project partners in the ITEA project MOS2S.

If we may enlarge our scope from people to companies to understand the impact that has been created by ITEA, I would highly recommend that you read the article on Cape of Good Code, an SME started after an ITEA project. Not rarely, ITEA projects create start-up companies, new business lines for large industry companies or spin-off companies from large industries.

If we widen our perspective even more, from companies to countries, then please have a good read of the article about Sweden and the large industrial player ABB. I really like the definition of ‘Software as a Glue’ given in the ABB article, as we are experiencing how every object in our lives has some lines of software to be more integrated into our lives to make it easier, smoother and connected.

It is not only in our magazines that we are looking to the roots and the future of ITEA. On the 12 and 13 September in Berlin, we will have our yearly networking event, the ITEA PO Days 2023, with an exhibition for ITEA projects as an extension to the event this year. This way, you can have a glimpse of the future during the PO Days and have a look of its successes in the near future when you join us in Berlin. I invite you!

I wish you a joyful reading.

Zeynep Sarılar