Qatar Mobility Innovations Centre (QMIC) participated in the third Co-operative Mobility Services Interoperability Testing (Plugtests), co-organised by the Centre for Testing and Interoperability of ETSI (European Telecommunications Standards Institute) and ERTICO (ITS Europe), in Essen, Germany, recently.

The event was an opportunity for global companies and R&D institutions to test their prototypes against the Co-operative ITS Communication standards with their partners and competitors.

Dr Adnan Abu-Dayya, executive director of QMIC, said: “We have a strategic initiative to lead in the development and deployment of connected vehicle platforms and services in the region. Having our platform, which is fully made in Qatar, successfully tested against other global implementations is a testament to how far we have come as a leading national R&D centre in the region. This initiative is bringing us one step closer to realising the next generation of road safety applications and services in Qatar and the region.”

Dr Fethi Filali, a senior R&D expert and ITS technology lead at QMIC, said: “QMIC’s Connected Vehicle platform has been developed with financial support from the Qatar National Research Fund (QNRF) via the National Priorities Research Programme. We deeply appreciate QNRF funding of the CopITS project (www.copits.com), which allowed QMIC’s team to translate its research activities into fully functional and standard-compliant communication units for connected vehicles.”

A QMIC team led by Dr Hamid Menouar, product manager of the Connected Vehicle programme and R&D expert, represented the centre at the event. This is the third consecutive year in which QMIC has taken part in the global event.

As one of about 19 global entities that participated in the event, QMIC’s Connected Vehicles (Co-operative ITS) platform has been successfully tested against prototypes of other big companies and R&D institutions in the field. This was carried out to check interoperability between the different implementations and conformity with ETSI standards.

QMIC is located at Qatar Science & Technology Park.