February 2011: On the 15^th and 16^th February the ITEA2 PO (Project Outline) days were held at Paris, France. ITEA2 is the European platform for multi-national research projects. The PO days are a prepartion on the submission of new research projects. KE-works visited the PO preparation days to extend our European development partners and look for project opportunities.

For KE-works the ITEA2 platform is very succesfull. The 3D Testbench project that started in 2007 is one of the principal roots of KE-works. The 3D Testbench project will supply product designers with a test bench in which they can test a virtual version of their product. The project addresses the Dutch part of the ITEA2 project '3D-TESTBENCH' and focuses on specific aspects of the 3D-TESTBENCH vision.

Development of a domain specific modelling language coupled to optimisation techniques and coupling of all tools through an agent based framework to form the desired test bench concept, are the key innovations the project aims for.

The results will be implemented in a prototype 3D-TESTBENCH to support the design and development process of wire harnesses designed and manufactured by Fokker Elmo - one of the globally leading companies - for the commercial and military aircraft. These wire harnesses become increasing complex, leading to extensive problems like those encountered by Airbus in its full scale development of its A380, resulting in delivery delays in the order of years.