The aesthetic appeal of wood burning stoves, able to enhance the home environment offering a gathering point for family and friends while now be providing additional heat. Following increased needs for more efficient combustion conditions (i.e. reduced fuel consumption (i.e. cost efficiency) and particle emissions); safe installations and minimum user intervention (i.e. reduced refueling time), FLORIAN is the latest innovation from ATech that solves these issues. Draft control through manually controlled mechanical vents and fans are one of established solutions offered by the industry to increase the efficiency of wood log stoves. Nevertheless, manual solutions require constant user intervention to ensure sufficient utilization of the firewood and efficient combustion conditions, and their speed and effectiveness is far away and incomparable to a fully automatic solution. With FLORIAN we offer an innovative device differentiated from traditional solutions due to its intelligent (embedded algorithm) and fully automated nature which combines both mechanical (flap, fan) and electronic parts (regulation, sensors, automatic controller). Our company, ATech has more than 25 years of experience as a contract manufacturer of electronic components. Since 2008, we focused on R&D of biomass combustion control electronics. FLORIAN is the best price and technologically robust solution that will generate optimal combustion conditions in wood stoves and ovens. FLORIAN offers a reduced 20% fuel consumption and emissions combining it with the maximum user comfort which will allow us to be established as a key player in (Heating, Ventilation and Air Conditioning) HVAC market. According to our initial estimations, through the commercialisation of FLORIAN we expect to reach €45 million revenues five years after its commercialization boosting the expansion of our international network, increasing our staff, and achieve a Cumulative Return of Investment of 5.63 in 2024.

The greatest challenge for today's Europe’s engineering economies is the so called smart industry, which is understood as the intelligent IT-based components and systems within all key areas of supply, production and distribution chains. This irreversible leap forward in industrial development is comparable with the introduction of steam power, electricity or basic IT at previous stages and is therefore known as the fourth industrial revolution.Engineering enterprises must act quickly because they need to:• build-up IT-controlled communication and interaction processes between various actors during the entire production and value chain• develop and implement Cyber-Physical Systems• redefine management and staff skills• restructure work organisation and communication flowUnfortunately, Europe’s enterprises are poorly prepared for these developments and lag behind their competitors in the USA and Asia. In particular SMEs, the backbone of Europe’s industry and still global leaders in many parts of the market, are under enormous pressure in order not to completely lose contact and their share of the market in the medium-term. Recently, some national initiatives have put smart industry on the agenda, however these are very generic, not interlinked with each other and provide little support to SMEs.Therefore, the SMeART project has been initiated to build up sustainable cooperation between HEIs and engineering SMEs to ensure the successful transfer to smart industry by:• Comparative description of major smart industry initiatives in all 28 member states, interlinking them through our project• A survey on smart industry situation of engineering SMEs and profiling of clear areas for support and guidance by HEIs• Development of a HEI business cooperation model for upskilling SMEs to meet the challenges of smart engineering• Development of a sustainable learning, exchange and networking online portal to ensure further cooperation, development and lobbying.