The 15th International Conference of AAATE (Association for the Advancement of Assistive Technology) was held in Bologna from August 27th to 30^th, 2019. The association has 250 members, including institutions, universities, public and private subjects from the world of research and industry and is the most important international group for the study, exchange and sharing of information on assistive technology issues.

One of Lepida’s prerogatives is certainly to enter enterprise-type agreements to obtain advantageous licensing models, possibly unlimited, on certain brands; agreements that can propose certain costs and/or with advantageous discounts for members. This framework includes two agreements that Lepida has signed with Oracle and VMware for the supply of part of the software products in the portfolio of these two major multinationals, with unlimited licensing methods.

Lepida participated in the project, carried out by Rete Ferroviaria Italiana and requested by the Prefecture of Bologna, for the construction of a communication infrastructure to ensure operational continuity for public utilities and emergency services in the Kiss & Ride area and underground floors of the Bologna Central HS station.

Lepida is trying to support its members in the provision of digital infrastructure on the territory, particularly with regard to the use of data; often the difficulty is not due to their availability, but to a poor ability to intercept them, collect them and interpreting their meaning, therefore their value. Lepida has therefore created a platform, in the context of Big Data, which can collect data (ingestion process) from real time flows and existing databases.

The Lepida Network currently connects - in addition to all the 328 municipalities in the Region – 1.179 schools, 236 sites between Local Health Authorities, Hospitals and GPs clinics, and 519 offices from other bodies (additional municipal offices, Provinces, Municipalities, Unions, regional agencies, associations for personal services, redevelopment consortia, universities, theaters, courts, museums, research institutes, regional railways, industrial areas, Civil Protection), for a total of 2.362 access points.

The number of requests received by Lepida for connectivity with the Ultra Wideband increases on a daily basis. The plan in Emilia-Romagna foresees two actions: backbones and access. The backbones are carried out by Lepida as an extension of the Lepida Network, while Open Fiber is in charge of the access procedures, as the concession holder chosen through a public selection. The backbone activates a territory or an area. Access activates a building or an individual property unit.

The new connection of the Lepida Network to the MiX in Milan has become operational. The MiX is the largest national interconnection point, where Lepida has been operating since 2013 and participates in the pooling environment by exchanging traffic directly with the most important national and international operators: Google, Facebook, Amazon, Akamai, Hurricane Electric, Netflix, Microsoft and many others.

A report recently published by the European Environment Agency (EEA) has studied the relationship between social and environmental problems. The report highlights how the less wealthy persons, the elderly and the very young are the people at most risk, and stresses the need to align social and environmental policies with more effective measures to protect the environment and citizens from the impacts of extreme temperatures, heat waves and air pollution.

The final conference of the RainBO Life project was held on June 7th in the Renaissance Room of the Civic Archaeological Museum of Bologna, after three years of intense planning, development and meetings with all the interested parties: the municipalities for which the project was designed, but also the Civil Protection, consortia operating in decontamination, Associations and private companies.

The "Sustainable PA Award - 100 projects to reach the objectives of the 2030 Agenda” is an initiative promoted by the PA Forum in collaboration with ASviS (Italian Alliance for Sustainable Development), taking place for the second year within the PA Forum 2019, and aiming at collecting the best practical projects/products that promote the sustainable utopia and can help Italy, and in particular each territory, to address the many weaknesses of the current model of development, choosing a path of sustainable growth to be followed until and beyond 2030.