It started at the Technical University Berlin with the idea of decentralizing automation platforms.

After his studies in computer engineering, Kai Grunert immersed himself in teaching and research on Business Process Management Systems (BPMS) and IT architectures. Over the years, the idea evolved to automate modeled processes cooperatively across many IoT machines, enhancing resource efficiency and resiliency.

To explore this idea, the research project, "PROCess EnginE in a Distributed Environment" (PROCEED), was initiated and approved by the Ministry of Education and Research in Germany in 2018. In order to test the concept, a new open-source project was initiated, building on the standardized BPMN process notation.

The success of the project led to the establishment of a thriving open source ecosystem, which formed the basis for subsequent research projects. For example, in collaboration with Siemens, efforts were focused on improving the manufacturing of electric drives by increasing supply chain transparency and automating certain production processes.

Today, the PROCEED platform is being further developed in cooperation with companies and within innovative research projects. We are very excited to see where the future will take it.