MBLabs will facilitate the process for the testing and certification of building envelope technologies developed by European SMEs. By creating a “”booking.com”” (as services marketplace) with laboratory testing facilities and by offering “”certification partnering”” service between testing facilities and SMEs, the costs associated with testing and certification will decrease and their utilisation will increase with benefits for a great number of companies. Besides, this will shorten the cycle for innovative and sustainable technologies to be utilized in building construction and retrofitting activities. In detail, the project objectives are as follows: Socio-economic and Environmental objectives – To unlock potential, enhance critical mass and internationalisation, improve market responsiveness, product competitiveness and market impacts of European construction SMEs; – To fully implement the integration of end-users/society and the natural environment in a new mainstream EU innovation pathway and related performance tests and certifications; – To contribute to the EU response to the emerging post-COVID19 crisis by providing tools that reinforce the construction sector value-chain (as the first employer in Europe), boosting economic activity. Sectoral, Replication and Exploitation objectives – To help building up the future, upgradable, competitive, sustainable and inclusive European Innovation Ecosystem and OITB for the Built Environment industrial sector, managed by a new, sustainable METABUILDING association, closely linked to the European Construction, built environment and energy efficient building Technology Platform (ECTP); – To stimulate investments in building-envelope innovations and technologies by providing testbed evidence for companies and investors while complying with EU regulatory practices adapted to local specifications. – To enhance the contribution of the Construction Sector to the Sustainable Development goals by upskilling the sector operators, reducing the existing barriers and launching an ecosystem that increases competitiveness and gives access to better business opportunities. Clustered Scientific and Technical objectives – To fully implement a meta-clustering approach in the 13 countries represented by the MBLabs project as the pro-active solution for bringing SMEs into the OITB ecosystem while leveraging the cascade funding mechanism established in METABUILDING INNOSUP project. This will jump-start MBLabs OITB with cross-sectoral Call for Projects, based on Challenges to Building envelopes; – To harmonize and upgrade the lab test facilities in a coherent set of services for a better readability of envelope materials technical characterization adapted to the new, smart technologies; – To develop a standardized, high quality, fast, affordable, replicable, Open Source, Open Access, Open Data 1:1 scale, real conditions testbed; – To develop, test and scale up marketable, cheap, flexible, on-demand, innovative material-based solutions for energy- and resource-efficient buildings.

R2M serves as project exploitation manager, the replication work package leader, and pilot manager. In these roles, R2M has the important duty to co-design the METABUILDING ecosystem defining the Single-Entry Point, its business model, the set-up of the association that will manage the ecosystem after the end of the project, and the overall management of the testing plan and workflows across the project pilot activities. In collaboration with CASA SpA, R2M has also responsibilities for design and testing of building envelope solutions at a social housing condominium in Florence acting as a Living Lab. Lastly, R2M will help design, construct and manage after the project an “Open Source Building Envelope Test Bench (O3BET)” in Italy, which is a small research infrastructure testing facility for the testing of innovative envelope solutions. This will enable R2M to directly work with Italian SMEs for the testing and certification of their technologies.