From his webpage (https://people.epfl.ch/cgi-bin/people?id=105551&op=bio&lang=en&cvlang=en):

Closed-Loop Lifecycle Management for Sustainable Production and Consumption of Complex Products: In the coming years the use of Embedded Information Devices (including RFID) will be extended from the current use in identification and logistics applications (mainly in the retail sector) to a wide variety of other applications through generalised tagging of product (or artefacts) . These wider applications almost inevitably include the involvement of consumers and users beyond the traditional interpretation of existing product life-cycle management (PLM), to promote holistic information exchange between designers, producers, users and recoverers of future complex products. Therefore, the management of data and information flows and D-I-K (Data-Information-Knowledge) transformations all along the lifecycle of products will involve more and more consumers/users and service providers’ interactions. My main targets within this context are; (i) to investigate the above mentioned challenges and to conceptualise them within the context of a closed-loop PLM, and (ii) to define the foundations and specifications of the necessary ICT developments, models and software systems that will support the seamless and trustful sharing of knowledge amongst producers and consumers/users of complex products so that the concept of sustainable production and consumption is adopted and applied by modern societies.