The final study visit brought the SimpliVi project back to where it all began: Vienna, Austria.
On the 25 June 2025 the project team was received at the Commercial Court in Vienna by the president of the court. The team discussed the topic of videoconferencing with practitioners and technical support staff from the court and the Federal Ministry of Justice. These experts shared their extensive practical experience, both for national and cross-border videoconferencing in the judicial field. The experts showed, that the organizational problems have largely been resolved by the established workflows. Now the focus is more on further refinining the technical set-up to make videoconference situations closer to real-life hearings. This was demonstrated in a typical courtroom equipped with videoconferencing facilities as can be found in every court in Austria.
On 26 June the participants visited the Regional Court for Criminal Matters of Vienna. The expert from the Ministry of Justice made an extensive hands-on demonstration of the “Justice 3.0” facilities of an even more modern courtroom. Justice 3.0 is the fully digital, paperless file used in Austria. In the court room the old stacks of paper have been replaced with monitors used by the judge, the parties and the witness. The fully digital file not only facilities court procedures in general, but it is particulary useful for videoconferences: As all documents are electronically available, they can simple be shared on-screen. A document camera or even holding it up a paper to the camera is not necessary. Two easy-to-use touch panels are used to control the electronic file and the videoconference.
The study visit clearly showed showed how the Austrian judiciary has been able to refine both the processes and technical solutions for videoconferencing over the years. Key findings were:
• Local IT support plays a crucial role for the acceptance of VC, especially for cross-border VCs. Centralizing this competence at local IT support allows them to gather experience and facilitate a smooth setup of a cross-border VC.
• As the person to be heard must not be influenced the judge should ask the witness to show the room, especially when joining from a private location.
• Regarding the legal diversity in Europe it was considered to be very helpful to have information easily accessible regarding the European legal basis (e.g.DigiReg) and National laws for VC.
• Before requesting a cross-border VC read the information available at the e-Justice Portal about VC framework in the requested country.
• Use standardised forms for setting up a VC. The ToE and EIO forms do not provide a sufficient level of detail.
• A user friendly design of the VC systems is a success factor for the user acceptance.
• The setup of a videoconference is well integrated into existing workflows of the respective proceedings. It is not a separate workflow. However, this is only possible due to the high level of digitalization in Austria. Having a VC system does not do the job alone. A proper integration is necessary.
The study visit was accompanied by project internal workshops, which were held both afternoons, to discuss the finalization of the project’s Deliverables and to prepare the SimpliVi Conference.
The evenings were reserved for culinary experiences: On the first evening project participants managed to escape from the summer heat wave in a beer garden of the famous “Prater”, a large green area and also an amusement park. On the second evening this was complemented with a diner at a traditional wine tavern (“Heuriger”) in the hills of Vienna.
by Sebastian Leitner
