European Open Science Cloud (EOSC)

What is EOSC?

The objective of the European Open Science Cloud (EOSC) is to provide researchers and innovators in Europe with an open and trusted multi-disciplinary environment where they can publish, find and reuse data, tools and services for research and innovation. Through this environment, EOSC aims to mobilise, align and scale resources across Europe to accelerate open science, higher productivity and increased reproducibility and trust in research.

EOSC should catalyse access for researchers and machines to high-value, machine-actionable research data and other digital objects produced along the research life cycle, such as software and publications. It should enable interoperability of data across and within disciplines, and (re-)use of data by linking them with related tools and services, in line with the ‘FAIR’ (Findability, Accessibility, Interoperability, Reusability) data principles.

EOSC ultimately aims to contribute to a 'web of FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable and Reuseable) data and services' for science in Europe, upon which a wide range of value-added services can be built.

EOSC is recognised by the Council of the European Union among the priority actions of the policy agenda of the European Research Area (ERA) with the objective to deepen open science practices in Europe. It is also recognised as the common European research and innovation data space, articulated with the other sectoral data spaces defined in the European strategy for data.

EOSC implementation

The implementation of EOSC is currently taking place in the context of the EOSC European co-programmed partnership according to a Strategic Research and Innovation Agenda (SRIA), which is co-developed with the EOSC community.

Steps are being taken to realise the objective to establish EOSC as a federated system of systems for sharing of research data and digital resources across Europe.

The EOSC EU Node, procured by the European Commission, was launched in October 2024. It is the first node of the EOSC Federation, providing a set of data, tools and services to researchers across Europe. It also serves as reference node and facilitates the interconnection of other nodes in the EOSC Federation. It is implemented by federating data, tools and services by data repositories, research infrastructures, e-infrastructures and other scientific service providers across Europe into a network of nodes.

Engagement and inclusion of other organisations is currently being pursued to expand the EOSC Federation with additional nodes for the benefit of researchers.

EOSC tripartite governance

The development of EOSC is steered by the EOSC tripartite governance involving the EU represented by the European Commission, the participating countries represented in the EOSC Steering Board and the research community represented by the EOSC Association.

The EOSC Steering Board is composed of the EU member states and countries associated to Horizon Europe, with the aim to provide advice and expertise to the Commission in relation to the strategy for the implementation of EOSC as part of the ERA actions, to support coordination of and synergies with European and national policies and investments in EOSC and to help monitoring the overall EOSC strategic development and implementation. 

The EOSC Association is an international non-profit organisation under Belgian law that aims to provide a single voice for advocacy and representation of the broader EOSC stakeholder community.

The EOSC tripartite governance ensures dialogue and strategic coordination towards achieving the EOSC policy objectives. It typically meets twice a year to discuss achievements of the implementation of EOSC and strategic orientations for its future development. See the published reports of past meetings and the EOSC tripartite policy narrative for EOSC.

The EOSC Tripartite governance is also addressing options for the governance, operations and financing of EOSC after the end of the current funding framework to ensure the long-term sustainability and uptake of EOSC as the common European research and innovation data space.