ActiveAdvice: A Multi-stakeholder Perspective to Understand Functional Requirements of an Online Advice Platform for AAL Products and Services

Abstract

For the last 10 years, ageing well in the community has become a key concern of the European Union and its member states. Action plans as well as distinct programs such as the Ambient Assisted Living (AAL) Joint Programme are evidence of this engagement. Since then, many AAL products and services have been developed and implemented in the European market. Up to now, however, access to, and the availability of these solutions is difficult, and the information on their use is scarce. ActiveAdvice, an AAL EU-funded project aims to develop an online platform which offers both information on AAL solutions as well as advice to end users. This paper discusses the application of a multi-stakeholder perspective approach. It discusses the user-centered development and reflects on the establishment of AAL ecosystems and the functional requirements of the ActiveAdvice platform. It includes an extended methodological framework, which explains conclusively the ActiveAdvice stakeholders’ identification process and the user-centered requirements analysis, built on 38 semi-structured interviews with three stakeholder groups – consumers, businesses and governments. The integration of different stakeholders in the development and implementation of AAL solutions is a necessity as well as a challenge. This holds also true for the development of the ActiveAdvice platform.