Digital Villages: How Digital Ecosystems Are Structured and What They Can Do

Abstract

The Fraunhofer Institute for Experimental Software Engineering IESE demonstrates, in its “Digital Villages” project, how digitization is opening up new opportunities for rural regions. The project began in summer 2015 with the aim of examining the challenges ofmodern life in rural areas in terms of digitization. Since then, concepts and solutions have emerged that reveal the possibilities inherent in taking a holistic view of the topic of digitization, in the sense of a digital ecosystem. The project, funded by the Rhineland-Palatinate Ministry of the Interior and for Sport, Fraunhofer IESE and the Rhineland-Palatinate Development Agency, is considered a pioneer for many other initiatives that have since emerged in Germany. Their mutual aim is to put digital services in rural areas to the test and make them sustainable.