Objective. The field of ambient assisted living (AAL) is attracting increasing attention from policymakers, industry and the general public. The reason is the growing number of elderly persons and the opportunities provided by new technological advances. The objective of MonAMI (Mainstreaming on Ambient Intelligence) is to demonstrate that accessible and useful services for elderly and disabled persons at home can be delivered on a mainstream, open-standard, flexible platform. A number of issues related to the market, exploitation, policies and business opportunities are also being addressed.

Main content. The technology base for delivering the MonAMI services is the MonAMI platform developed from mainstream, open-source components in an OSGi framework with a touch screen computer as the central element. Other parts are a Universal Control Hub as the user interfaces server, wireless sensor networks and a remote service management function. The total is a platform flexible enough to deliver a wide range of different services and facilitate future development and addition of services in a cost-effective manner. The services developed have been grouped into five packages: AMiSURE for safety and security, AMiCASA for home control, AMiVUE for home status information, AMiPAL for time management and AMiPLAY for games. The technology and the services have been installed and evaluated in the homes of 62 users in Slovakia, Spain and Sweden.

Results. The field trial ran for three months ending in March 2011. The evaluation covers the benefit to the users as well as operational parameters, reliability and scalability.

Conclusions. MonAMI has provided a proof of concept of the benefit and feasibility of AAL services over a home platform. The challenge now is to create a mainstream market for AAL applications, i.e. an ecosystem that provides economic opportunities while addressing the social necessity of our ageing society. MonAMI has identified a three-phase roadmap to that end.