Expanding and deepening the EOSC Federation (EOSC Partnership)

Expected Outcome:

Project results are expected to contribute to the following outcomes:

• The EOSC Federation provides to EOSC users with state-of-the-art digital services addressing their needs to store, process and share data, run software, models and workflows, and collaborate with their peers.
• Research and digital infrastructures and other organisations providing scientific services are equipped with appropriate structures and technical, legal and coordination mechanisms to onboard, manage and sustainably operate digital tools and services in the EOSC Federation.
• Investments across Europe in the provision of FAIR scientific data and services within EOSC are more aligned and coordinated, achieving economies of scale and more efficient use of digital resources.

Scope:

In order to carry out typical research workflows, researchers need to use a broad range of digital services such as data storage, computing, applications, and collaboration tools. Such services are often cost-intensive and their provision is restricted, e.g. to researchers within a country/region or a specific thematic area. The EOSC Federation aims to provide a trusted, sovereign and secure environment to researchers in Europe to use high-quality, FAIR research data and run research workflows, with a focus on cross-disciplinary and cross-country research collaboration.

The aim of the topic is to set up an EOSC Federation-wide mechanism that enables multiple organisations to seamlessly offer such digital services, and to support the sustained provision of these services to EOSC users. It also aims to enlarge the EOSC Federation by supporting the expansion of Nodes as gateways through which multiple organisations can offer their resources, such as data and services, to EOSC users.

Proposals should cover the following activities:

1) Provide seamless, user-friendly access to EOSC users to digital services for typical research workflows such as data storage, computing, applications, and collaboration tools, through a fully integrated EOSC Federation-wide system.

• Gather requirements and analyse needs of researchers and EOSC users for such services and how they can best complement and integrate with existing resources in the EOSC Federation.
• Support developing and embedding a Federation-wide resource management and accounting system for the efficient provision of such services across the Federation, building on the design principles of the ‘virtual credit allocation’ system of the EOSC EU Node and any further development in the EOSC Federation.
• Provide access to EOSC users to such services, based on the researchers' and EOSC users' needs and requirements and making use of a Federation-wide resource management and accounting system and harmonised access policies, in line with the principles and guidelines of transnational and virtual access to European Research Infrastructures and related EOSC Federation policies.
• Upgrade the EOSC user experience through deep, back-end, cross-provider integration of key digital services covering the full research lifecycle, achieving a user-friendly and robust environment.
• Develop, test and demonstrate business models for the effective management of the supply and demand of such services, as well as for their long-term sustainable provision in the EOSC Federation, beyond the end of the project’s duration.
• Develop guidelines to facilitate a harmonised approach to the acquisition and provision of such services that supports research data sovereignty and research security in Europe, ensuring a trusted, secure and sovereign EOSC Federation.
• Establish mechanisms for continuous feedback and improvement, including indicators for monitoring the quality and usage of the services, building on and further developing existing mechanisms of the EOSC Federation, and ensuring that the evolving needs and requirements of EOSC users are met by the EOSC Federation.

These activities should be fully concerted and aligned with related parallel activities carried out by the EOSC Federation.

2) Support the broadening, integration and structuring of the participation of research communities in the EOSC Federation through

• the development and establishment of intra-Node coordination mechanisms and organisational models to enable EOSC Nodes to effectively represent broad communities and multiple organisations in the EOSC Federation,
• the development and use of digital capabilities, and of options for harmonised legal arrangements, such as contractual or service-level agreements, for onboarding and sustainably provisioning communities’ services through EOSC Nodes,
• broadening organisations’ engagement with and contribution to the EOSC Federation, including underrepresented thematic research communities or geographic areas.

Proposals should implement the activities through the organisation of joint calls that provide grants to third parties.

The joint calls should be open to organisations that participate or are interested to participate in the EOSC Federation either by operating an EOSC Node or by onboarding their identified resources to the EOSC Federation, in line with the relevant criteria set by the EOSC Federation.

Proposed activities should be driven by current gaps and needs of scientific communities, digital infrastructures and service providers. Proposals should clearly demonstrate how they will contribute to addressing these needs and increasing the uptake of the EOSC Federation by researchers.

The activities should comply with and contribute to the continuous update and upgrade of related EOSC Federation policies and standards, including technical and interoperability standards, the use of open standards, harmonised access and use policies, and cybersecurity^[1].

Proposals should include a robust and credible plan for the long-term, beyond the project’s duration, sustained operation of the services that they will make available in the EOSC Federation, and any other relevant project results.

For what concerns provision of access to digital services by third parties funded under the joint calls, proposals should include a list of the digital services that will be supported through the joint calls. The third parties funded under the joint calls should identify the specific digital services that they will provide for access and the amount of access made available to EOSC users, allocating budget according to users’ demand and making use of the Federation-wide resource management and accounting system. These third parties should also fulfil further conditions and requirements described in the ‘Virtual Access Activities’ part of the ‘Specific Features for Research Infrastructures’ section of this Work Programme, for what concerns publicity of the access offered, determining the access costs, and setting criteria for access by EOSC users in line with the EOSC Federation access policies. Proposals are expected to address compliance with these specific conditions and notably ensure that the selected third parties will provide appropriate documentation to support and justify the amount of access provided and corresponding costs.

Projects are encouraged to explore synergies with relevant EU initiatives such as EuroHPC. To ensure coherence and complementarity of outcomes, funded projects are expected to cooperate with each other and with relevant initiatives and projects contributing to the development of the EOSC Federation including actions awarded under the topics HORIZON-INFRA-2023-01-EOSC-04, HORIZON-INFRA-2024-EOSC-02-01, HORIZON-INFRA-2025-01-EOSC-01, HORIZON-INFRA-2026-01-EOSC-01 and closely interact with the organisational setup of the EOSC Federation. To this extent, proposals should provide for dedicated activities and earmark appropriate resources. This topic implements the co-programmed European Partnership for the European Open Science Cloud^[2].

[1] As described in the EOSC Federation Handbook and other relevant documentation potentially adopted by the EOSC Federation.

[2] https://eosc.eu/partnership/