A Mid-Term Review After 12 Months of Building a Research Department at Posedio
About a year ago, Paul Weißenbach and Stefan Dumss began driving the build-out of the development department at Posedio. Time for an initial mid-term review: which milestones have been reached, which research projects have been successfully completed – and what is the team currently working on?
The Team
Right at the start, we were able to welcome Stefan Dumss as our first team member in Research. Thanks to his many years of experience and his involvement at the Vienna University of Technology, he is an ideal addition to our still small team.
One project completed, another underway
Our first research project, "EuProGigant," kicked off on March 1, 2023. Within its scope, we took on the deployment and analysis of existing open-source Gaia-X Federated Services, along with the required infrastructure. A major part of the analysis involved troubleshooting, debugging, and adapting the software. The project was successfully completed at the end of February 2025. The expertise we built up around policy-based data spaces now forms the foundation of our ongoing work.
In parallel, we are currently working on the "Green Software Seal" project, focusing on three central topics: a cloud-native tool for real-time calculation of the CO₂ footprint of cloud applications based on metrics; a (self-)assessment tool for evaluating one's own cloud practices with respect to sustainability; and a CO₂ product passport for software, implemented as a Verifiable Credential. The project started in May 2025 and is currently in the implementation phase.
Contact network and research proposals
Over the course of the year, we have made numerous new contacts and held many exciting conversations – with groups from AIT, TU Wien, TU Darmstadt, marble.energy, EIT Manufacturing, and others. Together with various partners, we contributed to a total of five research proposals, two of them in a leading role. We were awarded funding for two of these five proposals – a good hit rate!
One of the three rejected proposals would have been particularly exciting. It centered on how AI can be used to achieve more resource-efficient and "compliance-conformant" Infrastructure as Code, a project on monitoring the CO₂ footprint of AI that is itself deployed for sustainability purposes, as well as a data space concept for customers and suppliers in plant engineering.
Two projects for the next three years
The two successfully submitted proposals are now in their start-up phase and secure our work for the coming three years. In terms of content, both revolve around our core theme of "Compliance as Code" and "Policies as Code" for secure, cross-company data exchange.
COMPLIANCE4DPP (Compliance for Digital Product Passport)
In the Horizon Europe project COMPLIANCE4DPP (Compliance for Digital Product Passport), we – as the smallest partner in the consortium – are designing and developing the central Compliance Engine. Our mandate is the automated verification of regulatory requirements in the context of digital product passports.
Metalin-X: Policy as Code for the industrial metaverse
In the "Metalin-X" project, the policy component for the industrial metaverse falls within our area of responsibility. Yes, mechanical engineers are lagging behind the trend when it comes to the metaverse – yet the industrial metaverse offers real added value: for exchanging 3D models and simulations, or for collaboration in virtual working environments. We are now helping to shape the infrastructure and expertise for compliant data exchange of such model data.
Outlook
One successfully completed project; one active project; two projects in their start-up phase; a growing network; and a clearly defined thematic profile in the areas of "policy-based compliance" and sustainable software: for the first year, with a team of two, these form a solid foundation. In year two, our focus is now on delivering the two projects "COMPLIANCE4DPP" and "Metalin-X" – the first work packages are coming up.
