EURECAT

General

Expertise

Eurecat is specialized in materials, industrial design, advanced manufacturing, ICT and multimedia technologies with a particular focus on transport, mobility, logistics and automotive fields, such as:

Advanced Manufacturing: Eurecat has extensive experience in developing new manufacturing processes, which in turn allow industrial implementation of new advanced materials:

Materials, Lightweighting solutions:

• Incremental metal forming technologies (ISF) / ISF adapted to robots.

• Hybrid forming processes: Extrusion-Blow Moulding Injection Moulding Technology (E-BIT), encapsulation of optics on flexible substrates.
• Functional printing technologies: Printed Electronics on flexible substrates.
• Development of thermoplastic composites: thermoplastic pultrusion, RTM, reinforced textiles,…
• Development of Advanced High Strength Steels (AHSS) and of new forming processes to make its implementation on an industrial scale feasible.
• Equal-channel angular pressing (ECAP).
• High pressure die casting for large structural parts.
• Plastic and aluminium nano-additivation.
• Compounding of bioplastics.
• Additive Manufacturing / Ultrasonic Deposition Modelling (UDM).
• Material characterization laboratories (mechanical, microstructural, tribological, corrosion, etc.)
• Pilot plants and industrial equipment to optimize process parameters.
• FEM simulation tools to support lightweight design & process optimization.

   Industry 4.0 approaches for smart, flexible and integrated manufacturing:

• Smart and connected tool/machine/product.

• Remote, interactive and adaptive operation monitoring and control.
• Big Data analytics for enhanced decision-support systems, manufacturing optimization, predictive maintenance, etc.
• Augmented and virtual reality for shop floor applications.
• Collaborative and autonomous robotics.
• FEM simulation: model development for parameter and manufacturing processes optimization

Powertrain systems and alternative fuels: In the field of electromobility, Eurecat has extensive knowledge and experience in defining and implementing plans of electrical and thermal testing with cells and modules for the development and certification of battery packs and battery management systems:

• Tests for benchmarking suppliers of cells, modules and battery packs
• Cell characterization testing for BMS development
• Ageing test for estimating life span
• Cycling and thermal testing for the development of electrical connections and battery cooling systems
• Battery approval and certification testing

Moreover, EURECAT has experience in designing and coordinating electromobility living labs:

• Technical and economic feasibility analysis of electric vehicle fleet implementation.
• Studies for the location and deployment of charging networks.
• Monitoring of electric vehicle fleets.
• Functional benchmarking of electric vehicles.

Environmental and Energy Sustainability: Eurecat has a specific unit specializing in the improvement of industrial processes as well as Life Cycle Assessment, Life Cycle Cost Analysis and Environmental Risk Assessments. Energy group capabilities include the improvement of the efficiency for energy use, integration of renewable sources and electric mobility.

Safe, Connected and Autonomous mobility: Eurecat develops recommender systems applied to mobility solutions. In the topic of journey planning, Eurecat offers solutions able to customize and enrich the mobility experience by learning from actual mobility patterns of citizens, taking into consideration their needs and preferences. Through context-aware recommendation techniques, our recommender systems are able to adapt the mobility to every situation, including contextual information like weather or traffic status and combining it with the context of citizens themselves, e.g. companionship, purpose of trips, etc. They enable the development of new services around the mobility of the cities, by combining mobility with other sectors like retail or tourism. 
Eurecat can also contribute with other components in the context of Mobility as a Service, like social innovation toolboxes, predictive user behaviour modelling, GPS tracking, mobility pattern extraction or destination tagging techniques. Eurecat also designs and develops the technological infrastructure required to operate all data and services to be included in platforms, including Big Data Analytics capabilities.

Cybersecurity: Our IT Security Unit includes 10 highly skilled professionals: 4 PhDs in computer sciences, telecommunications, electronics, 4 security engineers experts in ethical hacking, working on the following lines of research: Cybercrime (detection and mitigation, identification of patterns and irregularities, federation of information, etc.); Digital identity (privacy, anonymisation, authentication, etc.); Distributed security (Internet of Things, Cloud Computing); Security in mobile platforms. 

The unit is strongly involved in managing Cybersecurity in Autonomous Vehicles: Functional and technical requirements for the required connectivity (V2V and V2I). Authentication and identification of vehicles, Access keys management, message integrity; Tamper-proof in-vehicle platforms for automated vehicles building on and advancing the principles of cyber security for automated vehicles; incorporation of security-by-design concept in the process of design and manufacturing of vehicles, vehicle and platform audits, etc. 

The IT Security Unit has a specific Automotive Cybersecurity LAB for testing and benchmarking of cybersecurity solutions. Moreover, Eurecat works with national and international benchmarks (such as the European Agency ENISA and the Cloud Security Alliance) and has developed novel algorithms for the protection of key assets of the company and for advanced detection of cyber-attacks. 

Finally, the division of Robotics and Automation provides strong experience in technologies for safe and reliable automation, mechatronics, human-vehicle interaction, autonomous navigation, control and navigation systems, positioning (outdoor and indoor by combining GNSS with INS, laser scan, wi-fi, BLE and others). Eurecat has a GNSS simulator for diverse scenarios. 

Participation in EU Projects and International Activities

Eurecat is highly experienced in coordinating European R&D projects and support actions. The Public Programmes Area is responsible for our involvement in public funding programmes, project management and coordination of strategic projects with Eurecat’s participation, as well as our organization’s positioning in the various programmes and initiatives. In addition, it represents Eurecat in the different research and innovation forums, such as European Technology Platforms, Joint Technology Initiatives and related associations.

Examples of R&I projects led by Eurecat:

NewQP (Europe, FP7. 2011-2015). New Advances High Strength Steels by Q&P process for safety structures in passenger vehicles.

i-CUT (Europe, RFCS. 2015-2018). Integrative cutting solutions to produce high performance automotive components with high-Mn steel sheet.

STRUCTLIGHT (Spain–2011-2015). Development of new structural components for automotive in thermoplastic matrix, with different types of non-metallic fibres, with 30% of weight reduction, while increasing vehicle safety levels and ensuring its recyclability.

GTA-BATT (Spain – 2011-2014). Development of solutions that allow proper Battery Pack thermal management, with increased safety, improving performance in adverse weather conditions and increasing battery life.

TRUSS BATTERY (Spain – 2015). Electric and Hybrid Bus and Truck Smart Battery System Development of a modular energy storage system for hybrid, electric urban buses and trucks with enhanced life and improved performance.

SUPERHUB (FP7. 2011-2014). Sustainable and persuasive human mobility in future cities, aiming at providing an integrated toolkit able to stimulate citizens and goods transport companies to use alternative mobility resources.

Mobility2.0 (FP7. 2012-2015). Co-operative ITS Systems for Enhanced Electric Vehicle Mobility, development and testing of an in-vehicle commuting assistant for FEV mobility, resulting in more reliable and energy-efficient electro-mobility.

ICARUS (FP7. 2012-2015). Development of unmanned search and rescue devices embedded in appropriate information architecture and integrated into existing infrastructures.

Moreover, Eurecat has participated in the development of the CVC-UAB autonomous vehicle and in cybersecurity solutions to minimize vulnerabilities in the autonomous vehicle ("security by design" in hardware and software for V2X).