The IoT DIH will participate in the innovation and gender equality pilot tests of the GILL project

The IoT Digital Innovation Hub is part of the Gendered Innovation Living Labs - GILL project. An EU-funded initiative that addresses gender and diversity blindness in Living Lab discourse and practices to enable organisational and cultural changes, enhance professional development and gender equality.

GILL aims to become the open innovation framework for all European actors engaged in open innovation with a gender perspective. Its objectives include creating a pan-European hub for collaboration and learning, developing an open access IT-based learning platform that supports the functionality of the Hub, and providing proven methodologies, services and tools that enhance gender-smart innovation and entrepreneurship.

Pilot tests in innovation and gender equality 

In this regard, several pilots, in total 15 action-oriented experiments in 8 countries, have been launched by partners operating pilot actions for the GILL Living Lab, developing new approaches for gender-sensitive innovations, testing and evaluating the changes. 

Each pilot case provides a real-life environment where both open innovation and user innovation processes can be studied and new solutions developed. This unique capability enables the GILL Living Lab to generate concrete and tangible innovations based on user and community contributions, while at the same time advancing (academic) understanding of open and user innovation principles and processes.

The aim of the pilots is to assess how innovation is supported at its core, e.g. in team composition, idea generation and the extent of women's contribution to teams. Pilot sites have been set up in the UK, Italy, Greece, Romania, Czech Republic, Germany, Denmark and Spain, the IoT DIH will measure citizens' perceptions of gender equality measures. 

This is undoubtedly an excellent initiative and we hope that all the objectives will be met and exceeded.