Economic and Societal Significance of the Systems of Systems Research Agenda

The large-scale Systems of Systems (SoS) are there to improve the provision of societal services. These are driven by global drivers such as population growth, aging, food security, energy security and climate change. However, a considerable number of SoS projects resulted in failures, causing detrimental economic impact. This paper presents a set of preliminary results from an European Commission (EC) funded project called T-AREA-SoS (Trans-Atlantic Research and Education Agenda on Systems of Systems). The primary purpose of T-AREA-SoS is to provide input to EC´s 80 billion Horizon 2020 research programme in formulating a Strategic Research Agenda for Systems of Systems Engineering (SoSE) that spans American and European activities. An initial set of prioritised SoSE research elements derived from an online survey are discussed from an economic and societal stance using examples from heterogeneous sectors such as transport, energy and manufacturing.