The Gavius project, present at national and international conferences and innovation fairs

Since the approval of the project by the European Union, it has been presented at various events as an example of technological innovation and administration. Gavius is an example of how artificial intelligence and Big Data can have effective applications for citizens and help achieve proactive councils in various areas.

In August 2019, the European Urban Innovative Actions (UIA) program granted the Gavius project the necessary funding to create a virtual assistant, which will allow citizens to know and process social aid. The project was one of 20 selected from 175 proposals submitted by 23 member states. In addition, Gavà, together with Getafe City Council, were the only two councils in Spain to receive this subsidy.

The official presentation of Gavius took place a few months later, on November 15, 2019, but before that, the project was already shown at the Digital Government Congress held in September of the same year. This is a reference discussion forum in Catalonia in the field of digital administration, and it presents innovative experiences that respond to the different needs of citizens. The different initiatives presented, including Gavius, focused on innovation, personalised mobile services, digital talent, co-creation or data protection. The main person in charge of Gavius, Isabel Arnet, explained to the attendees the beginnings of the project, its objectives, the methodology that will be used, the implementation phases and the financing.

The mayor of Gavà, Raquel Sánchez, expressed the same opinion at the Smart City Expo World Congress, held at Fira de Barcelona from 19 to 21 November 2019. She did so at the stand that the Barcelona Provincial Council had in this event, the main internationally on smart cities. In her presentation, Sánchez emphasised that the intention with Gavius is “to use artificial intelligence to identify the citizen and, thus, to have information about his situation as a user of social services. From here, things get trickier, and this is where the true benefits lie.” The mayor also did not miss the opportunity to express her “pride in the challenge that the whole definition process has posed and in having been recognised”, about the funding obtained from the European Union’s ERDF fund. Finally, Raquel Sánchez said that the ambition of the Gavà City Council and the other partners in the project is that this can be replicated both in other municipal services and in other European cities.

At the beginning of December 2019, Gavius was shown at another outstanding event, the XVIII Annual Conference of the Intermunicipal Comparison Circle of Social Services, organised by the Barcelona Provincial Council. In it, there was a central presentation on challenges and opportunities in the field of social services, another on the Circle of Comparison and a round table on levers for change in social services. It is in this last part of the program where Isabel Arnet took part, again presenting Gavius as an innovative tool to put artificial intelligence at the service of the citizens and turn the local administration into a proactive public organisation. The Gavius project has also been explained in more informal settings, such as the meeting between the Barcelona Provincial Council and the Swedish Association of Local Authorities this February.