Overview

The Marketplace is a software system deployed and maintained by the Marketplace operator. The main provided functionality is to connect customers (wanting to share their data and use energy services) to eligible parties (wanting to collect energy data of customers and offer energy services). To this end, the Marketplace includes components running on computing infrastructure managed by the Marketplace operator, e.g, in the cloud or on premise.

Why is the Marketplace necessary in the context of EDDIE?

While customers may want to find eligible parties to access services, and eligible parties may need to find customers for collecting energy data, there is no catalog where customers can search for services, and eligible parties can search for data of customers. For this reason, the Marketplace offers a discovery mechanism for customers and eligible parties. The eligible parties can create in the Marketplace data requests which express the need to find customers willing to offer data, and data services which can be used by customers to access the output of services (e.g., visualizations, predictions, etc.). The customers can access the Marketplace to see the data requests and services, and interact with the respective eligible parties. Thus, the Marketplace aids in bringing together customers and eligible parties, who may then engage in data sharing independently of the Marketplace, i.e., no energy data is shared through the Marketplace.

How do customers and eligible parties access the Marketplace?

The Marketplace system includes two frontend applications for users: the Customer Mobile App for the customer, and the EP Web App for the eligible party. These applications provide interfaces for the users with tailored functionality for customers and eligible parties.

How does the Marketplace connect customers with eligible parties?

Apart from the frontend applications, the Marketplace system includes three more components with the following main functionalities: The Marketplace backend implements the necessary workflows, e.g., to register users, to search for data requests or services, etc. The Database stores information about the registered users, services, requests, etc. The IAM (Identity and Access Management) handles the authentication of registered users. Together, the components of the Marketplace implement the functionality to register users, submit data requests and services, search for services and requests, etc.