The Malaka TJV was also responsible for the draft version of the new hospital in Malaga, intended to be the new leading health center in Malaga for acute care, highly specialized and offering sophisticated healthcare technologies.

The building will be bioclimatic, efficient and highly technological, and will serve the people of Malaga for the next several decades. It has a flexible design so that it can easily adapt to the constant changes that occur in medical technology, and to provide new medical treatments that are much more personalized than today’s. In this sense, principles and design improvements aimed at the humanization of spaces will be implemented and corrective measures will be developed against the sound condition and its impact. The hospital will also be completely digitized through robustly implemented Information and Communication Technologies.

The new complex, located next to the Civil Hospital, will entail an estimated investment of 380 million euros and will have a total built area of 270,300 square meters (197,600 dedicated to the hospital building proper and 73,600 to the parking lot and loading and unloading dock). The approximate project construction time is 60 months.

It will be divided into four towers, with 15 floors, 12 above ground and three basements. The hospitalization area, which takes up eight full floors, will have an area with 27 hospitalization units, 810 rooms and a day hospital with 108 positions, as well as four ICU units with 66 rooms, 42 operating rooms, 48 major outpatient surgery posts, 189 external consultations, 31 special examination rooms and a teaching and research area.

The combined experience of the various companies in the TJV guarantees that the facility will be an efficient, innovative and sustainable building equipped with the technologies needed to offer patients maximum comfort.

ALANO must initially cover the logistical support needs of a platoon or of medical evacuation operations (MEDEVAC). The vehicle was first presented to Spanish Defense Ministry officials on Monday, October 10, at the Alijares Proving Ground (Toledo), as part of the 2E+I Forum.

The ALANO project hopes to meet the needs of Spain’s Army and was carried out under the auspices of Force 35 of the Army Logistics Support Command, and consolidates the initiative that resulted in these companies being chosen for this project as part of the DGAM’s (Directorate General of Armaments and Matériel) COINCIDENTE R&D program.

The ALANO vehicle is approximately 3 m long and has a payload capacity of 650 kg. The vehicle has also been designed to reach 20 km/h, and it can travel on vertical slopes of up to 70%, and lateral slopes of up to 40%. ALANO offers a standardized, modular and open architecture and is able to integrate future work or payload modules to acquire new capabilities that will let it take part in security, surveillance and protection missions

The platform works both in remote operated mode and in autonomous navigation mode, and has the capacity to detect obstacles thanks to a combination of sensors that allow it to have a multimodal sensing system. When operating autonomously, it has both tracking mode (“follow-me”) and return mode (“go-back-home”).

In this project, EINSA is responsible for the design and manufacture of the platform, which is made of light-weight materials using additive manufacturing techniques. The vehicle has outstanding off-road capabilities on all types of surfaces, thanks to its independent 6×6 electric drive. It has been designed as an open multi-mission robotic platform that is able to adapt to the mission needs of its users.

In addition to high mobility, EINSA focused its efforts on offering a vehicle with a long-range capability by implementing optimal energy flow control through the different systems. The platform has also been equipped with a range extender, offering the platoon up to 10 hours of independence.

SENER Aeroespacial is responsible for developing the platform’s onboard real-time navigation system, which handles the geolocation of the platform and detects and identifies the position, in real time, of environmental elements, such as the road, other vehicles, obstacles, signals, etc.

It does so through a combination of multiple sensors. The data collected by these sensors is processed in real time in a processing unit, where it is merged to provide a more reliable and robust solution than that calculated by each sensor independently. Advanced data management techniques, information merging and artificial intelligence algorithms are used during the image processing.

INTA, through the Platforms and Vehicles Department of the General Sub-Directorate of Terrestrial Systems, is responsible for defining the user requirements and the system’s operational concept, and is providing support in the integration, testing and verification phases. It is doing so by offering the project its testing methods and the experience of its personnel in certifying military vehicles and in UGV projects.

The display of the ASCOD system as an optionally manned platform, in this case on rubber tracks, was carried out as part of the dynamic demonstration held on October 10th within the 2E+I Forum at the Los Alijares Maneuvers Field (Toledo) of the Infantry Academy and within the framework of the Force 35 initiative of the Logistics Support Command (MALE) of the Spanish Army. The Autonomous Platform ASCOD demonstrated its capabilities in an exercise designed by The Legion (Spanish Legion) to open a breach in a mine field, one of the most dangerous missions to be carried out. From a safe and protected position, the crew can drive and set the vehicle in position through the remote handheld multifunction driver display. The risk exposure to the crew in such situation is therefore significantly reduced.

The system provides the capacity for a remote and autonomous operation and being conceived as an add-on kit, it can be applied to newly designed ground platforms or transform conventional manned platforms into optionally unmanned platforms, a requirement that is increasingly in demand in the European Union and NATO for safe operations.

The ASCOD Platform Autonomous program is a clear example of cooperation among the Spanish Defense industry, based on the technological excellence of both companies, GDELS Santa Bárbara Sistemas and SENER Aeroespacial, to respond to the needs of the Spanish Armed Forces and, at the same time, position itself in the international market in a highly competitive manner and contributing to the export capacity of the Spanish Defense sector.

At the Toledo Forum, GDELS-Santa Bárbara Sistemas demonstrated constant innovation in the concept of a multipurpose platform that serves to integrate advanced and disruptive technologies into a Network of Capabilities (ASCOD), which allows efficient operation and management of vehicular systems both conventionally and autonomously or supervised autonomously. The demonstration of these new technologies signifies a qualitative innovation leap in the development of mobility capabilities that go beyond the design and manufacture of armored vehicles.

SENER Aeroespacial is responsible for the development of the platform’s real-time onboard navigation system, ensuring geolocation and real-time detection, identification, and positioning of elements in its environment such as the road, other vehicles, obstacles, signs. The system relies on a combination of multiple sensors. The data collected by these sensors is processed in a real-time processing unit where the merged and synergized data result in more reliable and robust information than those calculated by each of the sensors independently. Advanced data management techniques, information fusion, and artificial intelligence algorithms are used in the processor to process the images.

The program is the result of a collaboration agreement signed by both companies in 2021 with the aim of developing, designing and manufacturing a modular and interoperable system for armored platforms such as ASCOD as well as other wheeled or tracked vehicle systems.

The Director of Barcelona Metro, Oscar Playà, pointed out in recent statements to the media that smart and digitized ventilation management “guarantees health, and does so efficiently.” Ventilation, according to Playà, accounts for 40% of electricity use in stations, and with the digitization achieved with the RESPIRA® system, the director of the Barcelona Metro estimated the savings at 20%, or 3% of the network’s overall consumption, equivalent to 1.7 million euros. RESPIRA® is not just saving money; it is also contributing to sustainability by reducing electricity consumption by 6.2 GWh a year, which is equivalent to emitting 1,616 fewer tons of CO2.

Thanks to the ability of RESPIRA® to optimize HVAC systems with machine learning applications, and based on external parameters, RESPIRA® provides significant energy savings while maintaining comfortable conditions, thus maximizing the efficiency of the system. In the words of the data manager of the RESPIRA® team at SENER, Silvia Figuerola: “These data published by the TMB confirm the energy savings forecasts for the metro ventilation network that we had anticipated.” What’s more, RESPIRA® makes maintenance tasks more efficient by quickly identifying any abnormal operation in specific devices, and helping to determine those areas where new investments are most cost-effective. “As a result, the system helps us to efficiently and sustainably manage the equipment,” stated Figuerola.

How RESPIRA® works

RESPIRA® is an artificial intelligence system that is capable of lowering the heat index felt by passengers and metro workers by defining several criteria and reading parameters – such as the temperature, humidity and indoor air quality in the stations, and electricity consumption – in real time. These data are used by a dynamic algorithm to predict the environmental conditions inside stations (depending on the weather forecast, expected ridership levels and other factors) and then apply a mode of operation to each fan with the goal of improving the heat index while also minimizing electricity consumption. This way, RESPIRA® can be used to implement an optimal ventilation by sending individual speed setpoints to fans depending on the time and day.

Smart ventilation control also maximizes the amount of fresh air from the outside, a measure that results in increased hygiene inside the metro network and reduces the risk of spreading microorganisms, in keeping with guidelines from health authorities. This advantage will be particularly relevant with the arrival of fall and the expected spread of viruses that attack breathing passages, causing diseases such as the common cold, the flu and COVID-19.