Objectives 

The Hercules initiative is part of the Sectoral Commission on Information and Communication Technologies of the Conference of Rectors of Spanish Universities (CRUE-IT). Its objective is to create a Research Management System (RMS) based on open semantic data that offers a global vision of the research data of the Spanish University System (SUS), to improve the management, analysis and possible synergies between universities and the general public.

The project has a high component of research and development based on semantic web (WS) to homogenize the management of data, information and knowledge of the SUS, which will apply the WS approach for the representation, sharing and exploitation of the SUS research information.

This will require carrying out R&D tasks related to inherent problems not yet resolved in WS resulting from the existence of a set of information nodes that have to be interoperable even when the data are not described exactly with the same vocabularies, and that are capable of exploiting information related to research not available within the nodes of the network, but that is on the Internet. Ensuring the quality of the data (consistency, controlled redundancy, relevance) in this network is proposed as a relevant objective, since it is a project that must be understood in the context of the CRUE universities as a whole.

The following are expected benefits of the project:

• Joint exploitation of information.
• Unification of the criteria for obtaining information, providing greater guarantees of an adequate interpretation of the information and, with it, the accuracy of the indicators achieved.
• To be able to establish synergies and collaborations between universities and research groups.
• Increase transparency.
• Facilitate technology transfer and university-industry collaboration.
• To facilitate knowledge of scientific production, for the rest of researchers and for society in general.
• Facilitate the integration of the Standard Curriculum Vitae (SCV). Greater facility for the mobility of Research Teaching Staff (RTS) between Spanish universities.
• To provide users, taxpayers and society with statistical data that may be relevant from the point of view of transparency in the exercise of public service.
• And, finally, to allow the joint exploitation of research information from all universities, thus allowing total transparency in university management.