Ensuring the living experience wellbeing for a fully sustainable tomorrow also means investing in innovation and research. Veragouth and Xilema are aware of this urgency, and are committed to make their skills available as an industrial partner in national and international research projects; their contribution generally takes form in supporting the work of various research institutions involved. In this role, a source of particular satisfaction for Veraguoth and Xilema is to always be able to count on the collaboration with SUPSI (University of Applied Sciences and Arts of Southern Switzerland).

INEDIT (open INnovation Ecosystems for Do It Together process) is a project funded by the European Commission within the Horizon 2020 program framework; it involves 14 companies from 8 countries – including research institutes and companies – and spans a period of three years (2019-2022). The project aims to create a European DIT (Do It Together) ecosystem for the co-creation of sustainable furniture. A shared platform where the consumer’s creativity is supported by the professional skills of designers, achieved through access to know-how manufacturing specialists, providing new sustainable and customized products with a shorter time-to-market. The idea is to promote Social Manufacturing as an innovative concept, involving different expertise in the process, leading to the creation of value through participatory design and collaborative production. Sustainability and enhancing individual preferences will be among the guidelines of the project, together with social challenges such as reducing the amount of CO2 produced, and creating and maintaining job opportunities in Europe.

INEDIT wants to offer, through its digital and physical platform, a Social Manufacturing model that combines global design and local production from a circular economy perspective. Veragouth and Xilema is partner of the INEDIT project and is involved in the “use case 1” called “Flexible wood work centre”, managed in close collaboration with SCM Group (Italy). The foreseen 4 “use cases” are determined to demonstrate and validate part of the INEDIT processes. Besides participating in the different stages of project development, Veragouth and Xilema make their technicians’ expertise available to assist platform users in their choice of materials and design details. They also guarantee support from a technological and feasibility point of view regarding the production implications that the choices made by the users entail.