Development of Innovative Solutions by Living Lab (2/2)Knowledge sharing from a viewpoint of ordinary citzen

This article is written by Ms. Kazuko YUMA , Chief Fellow, Institute for International Socio-Economic Studies（NEC Group）

Practice in actual living environment

Functions of Living Lab can be performed not in the experimental environment like Dementia House but also in the actual living environment. izi Foundation in the Netherlands is NPO aiming to offer the accommodation for aged people to spend their life as long as possible. They are actually offering the apartment-house called “Gezond Langer Thuis (Healthy and longer life house)” in the Hague where about 280 single aged people are accommodated.

On its wall colorful arts are painted and it looks only as ordinal apartment-house, but, each individual apartment room is designed and equipped with facilities to assist the living of single aged people. In the bathroom the hand-rail is fixed to prevent tumble and the small chair is fixed also for the aged people to sit and have shower. Blind curtains which are difficult for them to reach are all remotely controlled.

In the kitchen there are sensors to detect fire and the tap for hot water looks made of stainless material but actually of plastic in order to prevent scald attributable to hot water. Drawers for dishes are widely opened and are fixed with preventive design for fingers not to be caught up for those aged with narrowed visual field.

Not only these practical facilities and devices but also such devices as communication robot with the form of cat are offered. Residents are all provided with smart-phone with emergency call button, so, they can easily communicate with outside party in an emergency case.

Role of Showroom

One of the other aspects of this apartment-house is the community room to function as showroom for outside parties. On every Friday the community room is full of residents who enjoy tea and cookies and chatting where such outside parties can also join as those who come to see the facilities of apartment-house and those who are engaged in research and development for aged people.

Residents are experiencing their new life supported by ICT like sensors and feeding back their experience and opinion. These experience and opinions are usefully and effectively utilized to study how new technology should be developed, leading to the new housing design with fusion of human being and technology.

Ensuring security and safety

Having explained above the deep involvement of aged people in PDCA cycle as actual users of the service and facility will contribute to the development of better product and service. In the apartment house of izi Foundation Information and Communication Technology (ICT) such as sensors are deployed comfortably in each room of nice Nordic design, and the efforts and arrangement made there is so impressive to keep co-existence of comfortable living and security and safety of aged people.

In Japan as well the importance of Living Lab is getting acknowledged as measure to create innovation. Advanced municipalities such as Matsumoto City of Nagano Prefecture, Kamakura City and Yokohama City of Kanagawa Prefecture have already started the initiative to utilize Living Lab, but, such initiative is still limited to a small number of municipalities.

In Europe horizontal connection is more focused between Living Labs developed in relevant countries and regions and “European Network of Living Lab (ENoLL)” is organized to share the knowledge among the members.

It is recommended that also in Japan such horizontal connection should be organized and strengthened, and even connection with overseas Living Lab should be established to share the knowledge, then, such arrangement can contribute to establish more active Living Lab system.