Role of partners
A strong consortium
Most organisations and individuals in ENTRANCE have already collaborated through previous successful EU funded projects such as C-BORD, CORE, CONTAIN, EUROSKY and are reuniting their capabilities to build the value chain of NII for effective border controls. A further strength of the consortium is the participation of five practitioners - Border Guards Authorities and/or Customs Authorities - readily engaged to defining the requirements and testing the solutions onsite. Besides technical aspects, the ENTRANCE solution will have been designed by customs, for customs.
Complementary expertise
The ENTRANCE partners combine a range of expertise as briefly described below:
Technology suppliers:
- Research & academia: CEA, the University of Padova and the Ruder Boskovic Institute are technology suppliers from the public research institutes and universities with extensive knowledge and long research track records in inspection range of technologies, nuclear material detection systems and illicit material detection
- SMEs: Arktis Radiation Detectors, Iris Instruments, ETC and CAEN are experts in the technology domains that are relevant for the inspection of containers and large-volume freight
- Large industry: Smiths Detection and Bertin Technologies are major industrial technology providers specialised in security equipment (X-Ray imaging systems and Gamma / neutron detectors)
Practitioners: Ministry of Finance - Customs Administration, Croatia, Financial Directorate of the Slovak Republic, National Customs Agency of Bulgaria, Belgian Customs and Excise and the Ministry of Interior, Croatia are Border Guards Authorities or Customs Authorities. Practitioners with expertise on customs’ requirements and challenges related to container inspection at Border Control Points
Experts: Joint Research Center, Center for the Study of Democracy and Michael Doherty Customs and Border Security Services all have expertise in technology assessment, practitioner requirements, ethical and sociological issues
Service provider: ARTTIC handles both the project management and communication and dissemination activities to ensure that the project results deliver a strong impact to relevant stakeholders
Role in the project
Arktis is a Swiss high-tech company with a US subsidiary and was founded in 2007 as a spin-off from ETH Zurich. Using technology ‘born’ at CERN, Geneva, Arktis’ main markets are homeland security and the nuclear industry and benefits from a team of developers with interdisciplinary backgrounds. Arktis has a track record of delivering well-managed, highly innovative radiation/nuclear detection development work for Government customers. Its facilities allow stationary and dynamic radiation sources tests.
ARKTIS brings the detection system developed under FP7 (MODES van), together with its existing radiation portal monitors (RPMs). It also brings developments made on low-cost, large-area neutron detection technology from the US DARPA SIGMA programme.