COOPERANTS

The lighthouse project "Collaborative Processes and Services for Aeronautics and Space" (COOPERANTS) has made significant contributions to the digitalization of processes in the aerospace industry. Funded by the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action (BMWK), the project was launched as part of the GAIA-X funding competition for innovative applications and data platforms in the digital ecosystem GAIA-X. The project received support under this program and officially started on February 11, 2022.

The objective of the COOPERANTS research project was to develop more efficient forms of future working methods and production processes over the entire lifecycle of aircrafts and spacecrafts. This aimed to strengthen the competitiveness of the aerospace industry in Germany and Europe. Specifically, it focused on enabling digital support for decentralized collaboration with local, national, and international partners, as well as distributed teams.

In the COOPERANTS project, challenges related to digitalization were analyzed, and solutions were developed that are based on GAIA-X principles. Besides considering intellectual property rights and implementing security concepts, the main focus of the research work was on developing and utilizing Gaia-X-compatible smart services. This provided SMEs and startups with a unique opportunity to exploit the potential of the GAIA-X cloud platform by offering their services directly through the secure European marketplace, enabling efficient collaboration with customers, suppliers, and other partners.

The COOPERANTS consortium's Perspektivforum marked the official completion of the research project in March 2025. The event provided an overview of the project's outcomes as well as various opportunities to engage in discussion which paved the way for operationalizing the COOPERANTS data platform. This platform, along with its associated marketplace, is located within the Pontus-X data ecosystem and can be accessed at the following link: COOPERANTS.

The COOPERANTS project consortium consisted of large industrial companies, SMEs, startups, and other research institutions. It was led by the Bundesnetzagentur under FKZ 68GX21003.

Research at the Institute of Data Science

At the DLR Institute for Data Science, researchers worked on Gaia-X compatible smart services to integrate data along supply chains. A key focus was on enabling data interoperability, even when data comes from different sources within a supply chain. To achieve this, an OpenAPI-based Semantic Adapter was developed, which enables mapping of data between different data schemas and facilitates data transformation and transfer. In collaboration with industrial and research partners, practical use cases were implemented and tested in the Concurrent Engineering Centers of the research partners.

Project runtime: 01/2022 - 03/2025

Funder: BMWK