FLORENCE — EOSC-Marine, three Horizon Europe projects and the EOSC Association have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on 15 October 2026 to strengthen collaboration and advance the EOSC Federation by aligning efforts to develop its federating capabilities and architecture.
15 October 2026
FLORENCE — EOSC-Marine, three Horizon Europe projects and the EOSC Association have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on 15 October 2026 to strengthen collaboration and advance the EOSC Federation by aligning efforts to develop its federating capabilities and architecture.
EOSC-Marine is one of four projects together with EOSC4ALL, EOSC-CONNECT and EOSC Mesh funded under the HORIZON-INFRA-2025-01 call to support the growing of the EOSC Federation. Collectively they receive approximately €33.5 million in EU funding. Each contributes a different capability to a shared ambition: making it easier for researchers across Europe to discover and access the data, tools and services they need, regardless of where those resources are hosted.
The projects address complementary challenges, from lowering the technical barriers to joining the EOSC Federation and connecting national research infrastructures to enabling interoperability between participating Nodes. EOSC-Marine is the project supporting the operationalization of the EOSC Node European DTO by integrating marine research resources.
Building a more connected and sustainable research ecosystem
The collaboration will focus on several interconnected priorities: technical interoperability, community engagement, governance and long-term sustainability.
1. Evolution of the federation architecture and federating capabilities. The projects will align architectures, interfaces, standards and operational practices where applicable, including metadata, APIs, authentication and data access. Together they will contribute to a roadmap describing how the EOSC Federation architecture can evolve towards a more distributed model.
2. Governance. The projects will work through the EOSC Federation Build-up Group as the current interim Governance Structure of the EOSC Federation to reach agreement with stakeholders. The roadmap and its timeline will be submitted for endorsement by the EOSC Node Coordinators Committee.
3. Engagement. The projects will exchange information on their outreach to EOSC Nodes, countries and communities, identify overlaps and agree on a joint engagement plan. This should reduce duplication and make it easier for stakeholders to take part to the EOSC Federation.
4. Sustainability. The projects will share their approaches to sustainability, including key exploitable results and best practices, following the open science principle "as open as possible, as closed as necessary". A consolidated summary will be shared each year with the EOSC Federation Build-up Group.
“Building the EOSC Federation is a collective endeavour,” said Bob Jones, Special Envoy for the EOSC Federation. “By aligning the project efforts, we can reduce fragmentation, avoid duplication and deliver a more coherent and impactful Federation—one that serves the needs of Europe’s research communities.”
The EOSC Association will coordinate the collaboration under the MoU, drawing on the complementary work of its Horizon Europe projects EOSC Gravity and EOSC United to align technical developments with the needs of research communities and support the Federation’s long-term development. The signatories will also coordinate engagement with national initiatives and EOSC Nodes, helping ensure that opportunities to participate are clear and accessible.
Turning collaboration into action
For the remainder of 2026, the signatories will develop a joint work plan identifying concrete activities, shared priorities and opportunities for collaboration. Implementation is expected to begin in early 2027. The agreement will remain in place until the end of the last participating project, currently scheduled for 31 August 2029. Throughout this period, the signatories will work to ensure that their activities reinforce one another and contribute to the Federation’s overall development.
Working through the EOSC Federation Build-up Group and its relevant Working Groups, the projects will identify opportunities to evolve the federation architecture and contribute to a shared roadmap for the Federation’s development.
By bringing together four infrastructure projects under a common collaboration framework the MoU reinforces the commitment to a coherent development of the EOSC Federation.
“The signature of this MoU opens a new chapter for EOSC-Marine and for the EOSC Node European Digital Twin Ocean. It turns into joint action what our workplan already foresees: working hand in hand with the most strategic initiatives in EOSC. Together with EOSC-A and the other EOSC-01 projects we will work on architecture, governance, engagement and sustainability, so that the experience of the marine community strengthens the whole EOSC Federation. These contributions will feed a White Paper with recommendations for the Federation’s onboarding and enrolment processes, and our Governance & Sustainability Plan, helping new Nodes to join and the Federation to grow on solid foundations.” Pasquale Pagano, CNR, EOSC-Marine project Coordinator