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Four EU pilot projects launched to prepare the European Cybersecurity Competence Network

CONCORDIA, ECHO, SPARTA and CyberSec4Europe are the four winning pilot projects of the 2018 Horizon 2020 cybersecurity call "establishing and operating a pilot for a European Cybersecurity Competence Network and developing a common European Cybersecurity Research & Innovation Roadmap". These four EU pilot projects are expected to strengthen the EU's cybersecurity capacity and tackle future cybersecurity challenges for a safer European Digital Single Market.

The four Horizon 2020 pilot projects will develop a sustainable European cybersecurity competence network. One the other hand, they will implement a variety of tasks such as cybersecurity demonstration cases in eHealth, finance, telecommunications, smart cities, transportation, Cyber Range, trainings or programmes to tackle the cybersecurity-skills gab in EU and deliver innovative marketable solutions made in EU to tackle the future cross domain cybersecurity challenges. The projects will closely cooperate and coordinate their activities. In addition, they are expected to work together with the European cybersecurity ecosystem in order to advance the way cybersecurity research, innovation and deployment is performed in Europe, and across sectors of our economy. The mission and objectives of CONCORDIA, ECHO, SPARTA and CyberSec4Europe are in line with the idea behind the European Commission proposal for a European Regulation establishing a European Cybersecurity Industrial, Technology and Research Competence Centre and a Network of National Cybersecurity Coordination Centres in 2021.

Commissioner for Digital Economy and Society, Mariya Gabriel said:

We are counting on CONCORDIA, ECHO, SPARTA and CyberSec4Europe to assist us in pooling Europe's cybersecurity expertise and preparing the European cybersecurity landscape in order to efficiently implement our vision for a more secure digital Europe. These projects will assist EU in defining, testing and establishing the governance model of a European Cybersecurity Competence Network of cybersecurity centres of excellence.

These pilot projects bring together more than 160 partners, including big companies, SMEs, universities and cybersecurity research institutes, from 26 EU Member States. The overall EU investment in these projects will be more than 63.5 million Euros. The CONCORDIA, ECHO, SPARTA and CyberSec4Europe were selected among 12 eligible proposals that the European Commission has received for the Horizon 2020 call SU-ICT-03-2018. This call is part of the Horizon 2020 focus area 'Boosting the effectiveness of the Security Union (SU)'