The ICMEg – the Integrated Computational Materials Engineering expert group - aims to build up a scientific network of stakeholders concentrating on boosting ICME into industrial application by defining a common communication standard for ICME relevant tools. This will allow the network stakeholders to benefit from sharing knowledge and best practice and thus promote a deeper understanding even between the different communities of materials scientists, IT engineers and industrial users. The Vision of ICMEg is a new strategy of materials and process development, where a variety of academic and commercial simulation tools – present and future – can be easily combined across different process steps and bridging several length scales in a “plug & play” type architecture being based on an object oriented, standardized information exchange.

The Mission of ICMEg is to establish and to maintain a network of contacts to

• simulation software providers around the world
  
• governmental and international standardization authorities
  
• ICME type users of simulation software
  
• different associations in the area of materials and processing
  
• academic developers of simulation software
  

The Mission of ICMEg further is

• to stimulate knowledge sharing in the field of multiscale materials design
  
• to define an ICME language in form of an open and standardized communication protocol
  
• to communicate this standard worldwide to make it widely accepted
  
• to discuss and to decide about future amendments to the initial standard
  
• to establish a legal body for a sustainable further development

The present ICMEg consortium comprises a total of 11 partners from 6 European countries. These are academic institutions and especially SME and private non-profit software providers in the areas of computational materials modeling and FEM simulations of materials processing. Each of them individually has already initiated own platform strategies towards integrative computational materials engineering.

The software providers/developers in the consortium are further complemented by governmental and academic institutions with a strong expertise and a sound background in applying simulation tools to through-process-modeling scenarios across several length scales from discrete small scale models (electronic, atomistic, mesoscopic) to models for casting, rolling, forging, heat treatment and joining processes at the component scale.

To account for the global approach being taken by ICMEg, the European consortium strongly interacts with a number of associated partners around the globe especially from the US, Japan and India. The project has officially been launched in October 2013. By now it has successfully organized the “First International Workshop on Software Solutions”, compiled a “Handbook of Software Solutions for ICME” and founded a non-profit association called “ICMEg e.V.” to secure a sustainable development of the communication standards once they are developed.

Current ICMEg activities aim at defining - in discussions with all interested stakeholders and volunteers - an ICME language in form of an open and standardized communication protocol. The 2nd International Workshop on Software Solutions for ICME represents a key event in this strategy. The findings and ideas raised during this workshop as well as a preliminary formulation of possible standards will be summarized in a White Book eventually documenting „Software standards for successful ICME“.

ICMEg is a coordination action funded by the European Commission under grant #NMP3-CA-2013-606711. For further information or to join the ICMEg effort please visit www.icmeg.eu