The article describes the main objectives of the BEMO-COFRA project and how it brings together universities and businesses in Brazil and Europe. It points out that the technologies developed as a result of BEMO-COFRA will have a potentially significant impact on industrial production processes. The article also highlights the advantages and benefits the four Brazilian partners will gain as a result of their participation in this Brazil-EU cooperation. Judith Kelner, the Brazilian project administration and co-ordination manager from the Federal University of Pernambuco, stresses that the project will generate new knowledge and experiences for CIn. “We have already developed a number of projects with researchers from several companies but this is our first opportunity to work with the industry”, Judith Kelner explains. The fact that the BEMO-COFRA framework will be deployed and tested in an actual manufacturing plant provided by COMAU and the Fiat Group is emphasised as a unique opportunity to generate new knowledge and experiences. Felipe Madeira, Head of Sales at COMAU Brazil, explains: “For Comau, one of the important points is to begin to develop innovation projects in Brazil, thus creating a hub of new technologies.” Similarly, Marcelo Borghetti, software manager from iVision, the other Brazilian business partner in the project, sees participating in BEMO-COFRA as a unique opportunity for working together with major research centres in Brazil and in Europe.

BEMO-COFRA is the first Brazil – European Union project of its kind and the technologies it will develop will have a potentially significant impact on industrial production processes. Project co-ordinator Markus Eisenhauer from the Fraunhaufer Institute for Applied Information Technology (FIT) explains: "The project is very important because it will bring together all of the company’s production lines. It (BEMO-COFRA) is an Internet of Things project”.

The half-page spread about the BEMO-COFRA project’s vision and objectives was published on 28 September 2011, the second day of BEMO-COFRA’s kick-off meeting, in the Economic section of the nationally well renowned newspaper Jornal do Commercio.

The entire article (in Portuguese) can be read here.