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2020, what an exciting year!

30. 12. 2020 / eHealth, GOV & NGOs, Heritage, Industry, Tourism One thing is for sure, everyone will remember this year. 2020 really was like a roller coaster: extreme, full of twists but at the same time so exciting! At Arctur we did not stand with arms crossed, we have followed our motto even more strongly: “We don’t follow the changes, we co-create them.” We are proud, that the results talk for themselves.

Arctur team is growing constantly, 8 new experts, officially called “Arcturians”, joined our family spread among three EU countries. In Spring and Summer, Arctur offered internships for students as a part of Arctur young generation programme.

Despite Covid-19 lockdown(s) the team consisting of management and accounting staff, programmers, (web) designers, developers, project leaders, IT support staff and innovators have continuously worked remotely without interruptions bringing the new success stories to life day after day.

Let´s have a look at the highlights of 2020:

  • Our experts have been working on 14 co-financed R&D projects (H2020, Interreg, EMFF, Erasmus+, National) and successfully collaborated with partners from several European countries and above.
  • Heritage+ team visited many places in Slovenia offering an exceptional cultural heritage with the aim to digitise the objects of interest and present them in innovative digital ways: through 3D models, video mapping, enriched (AR) and virtual (VR-360°) reality, promotional films etc. Impressive numbers testify the challenging work: more than 100.000 photos captured, 100 operational flight hours by drone (hovering is not counted in the number), 4 workshops with all leading tourist destinations in Slovenia and 23 impressive 3D models created.   
  • 4PM, Arctur’s digital tool for project management enabling dispersed teams to work efficiently even while working remotely, had proven its value this year. It was upgraded and redesigned to offer a more friendly user experience with 16% number of users increase from 2019 who managed over 1,417,510 tasks within this handy tool.
  • Tourism 4.0 team had to face the biggest challenge. Practically overnight all over the world tourism fell to point zero, but the Tourism 4.0 initiative has become even more active than before. More than 150 partners from 29 countries joined the Tourism 4.0 Partnership so far, the Tourism from Zero initiative was launched and the “zero in tourism” could be measured. More papers were published researching this field. Tourism Impact Model -TIM, the digital tool for measuring tourism impact and the first pillar of Tourism 4.0, was awarded with a golden plaquette for the best innovation of the North Primorska Region by the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Slovenia. But the end of the year was even more spectacular: TIM received the Award for the best innovation in Artificial Intelligence and Data Analytics at Tourism Innovation Summit in Seville, Spain. Currently more than 30 destinations are assessed with TIM at the Black Sea area, Danube region and in Slovenia pathing the way in data driven strategic thinking in tourism.
  • Talking about awards, additionally, our Automated Assessment Tool – AAT won the silver plaquette for the best innovations of the North Primorska Region and the overall assessment of digital maturity of Slovenian SMEs was performed by Digital Innovation Hubs.
  • Arctur’s WEB team designs, develops, supports and hosts web pages and web applications for more than 150 loyal clients from business, tourism and public administration. In 2020, 30 inspiring websites and web applications were released. To mention some: Bled Tourist Board, Dravske elektrarne Maribor, Hotel Boka, Jozef Stefan Institute F2, 360° virtual museum Fala, Open Villages, Boutique Hotel & Restaurant DAM and Dwarf's learning path App.
  • Ljubljana Airport chose Arctur to equip the airport terminal with AISense gamma-ray detectors.
  • HPC & Cloud team, in charge of Arctur-2, the flagship hyperconverged HPC & Cloud computing infrastructure, worked with SMEs which are using HPC infrastructure to run simulations. Our network, tools and systems have been successfully running 24/7. We are proud that at the beginning of the year, Arctur received the ISO 27001- Information Security Management System certificate.

As grand finale, end of December the cities of Nova Gorica and Gorizia gained the title European Capital of Culture 2025. Arctur actively took part in conceptualisation of the so- called application book and by the promotion of the #GoBorderless campaign. Our recently opened Huture Space will become a nexus connecting artistic and scientific creativity with business and industry offering place for different stakeholders who will innovate and bring fresh ideas to create a Huture – Human, Technology, Nature, Culture in the Future.  

Arctur´s work has been recognised globally, the news about us in local and foreign media, our experts participated in many events, forums and shows. Let’s mention only few: Presenting 3D model of Idrijske klavže in Delo, highlighting the Tourism 4.0 in Primorske novice, news on innovation prize for TIM in STO, achieving the point zero in tourism in the MMC, explaining how to co-create tourism for the future in the “Na Lepše” on national TV.

Business success matters to us, but also the responsibility to the environment and society. Win-win-win is our philosophy. With this spirit we also help the local community when needed. As the number of patients with respiratory problems has increased recently, Arctur donated respiratory devices to General Hospital in Šempeter.

Arctur is also initiator of the charity sport event named Goricatlon, which takes place each December in Nova Gorica to raise funds for the socially deprived children from Goriška Region. This year, due to the restrictions, Goricatlon took a new form – participants (including Arctur team) were cycling on the stationary bikes, empowering the Christmas light decoration on the main square in Nova Gorica and raised more than 2,300 EUR.

Despite working hard and suffering from Covid-19 lockdown, Arcturians also gathered to have fun. We hiked from Kromberk to Ajdovščina and participated at the solstice midnight party. We cycled in Posočje and got a big splash on Soča river while rafting. We celebrated all birthdays with many desserts and shared good vibes at beer Fridays.   

What will bring us 2021?

New projects and challenges, new staff joining, new occasions for spending time together and having fun. We are looking forward to all of that! And we want you to feel the same. Let’s embrace everything and #restart together. To create Huture, a future in which we all want to live.

Arctur Team is wishing you all good things on this New Year - pick the brightest wishes for you from our card and let them shine! Cheers to a prosperous new year!

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