The EGI Federation enters the “Twenties” with a new 5-year strategy looking forward to 2024. With the latest strategy, the federation reached full maturity as a key and reliable actor in the e-infrastructures landscape. We have expanded the number and diversity of research collaborations that we support, we have professionalised the service delivery with a federation core that achieved ISO 9000 and 20000 certifications and we are a key foundation of the European Open Science Cloud.
The new strategy adopted by the EGI Council considers key aspects in the ecosystem in which we operate, such as the new EC policy on the European Open Science Cloud, the big movement towards open science, the development of new research infrastructures and the new technical trends such as AI and containerisation.
At the center of the EGI Federation, there is the strong belief that all researchers should have seamless access to services, resources and expertise to collaborate and conduct world-class research and innovation. The core mission is to deliver open solutions for advanced computing and data analytics primarily to serve research communities and research infrastructures. As an inclusive initiative, we also support small international groups, individual researchers and the SME/industry via our national partners.
For the next five years, the EGI Federation identifies the following six strategic goals:
- Be a trusted service & technology partner for research and innovation: improve promotion and engagement with target user groups to further solidify the EGI Federation as trusted long-term partner;
- Evolve the service offering to meet the needs of researchers: focus on innovation and harmonisation of services by working with user communities and with peer e-infrastructure organisations towards reliable research-enabling services;
- Improve skills of users/operators and maturity in service providers: deliver dedicated training and consultancy to increase the knowledge and quality of work of users and operators; align service management and delivery across the federation to best practices and standards;
- Align business models to better support cross-border service provisioning: increase the efficiency in translating the needs of services and support from the target user groups to service providers of the EGI Federation in alignment with the national and community policies and business models;
- Strengthen the governance and broaden European coverage: ensure that the EGI Federation governance remain effective in the changing environment and grow the relationships with current and future EGI participants;
- Be a recognised foundation of the EOSC: position the services and expertise of the EGI Federation as key assets for the EOSC, especially for the Federating Core.
The EGI Foundation will continue to act as a key engine enabling its members to support international research and innovation together by operating and evolving a federation and management platform. This platform, on one side, enables service providers to harmonise interfaces and connect to a common hub, on the other side, aggregates demand and simplifies the access. To provide greater value from the resources and services pooled together, the EGI Foundation also facilitates discovery, access and use.
As we operate in a wide and diverse ecosystem of organisations serving research, we consider that the establishment of key strategic partnerships is a vital factor to better achieve our mission and strategic goals. In summary, we are all set to navigate this new decade and continue our support for advancing research in Europe and beyond.
For a full overview of the EGI Federation strategy for 2020-2024, have a look at the dedicated publication.
Sergio Andreozzi is Head of Strategy, Innovation and Communications at the EGI Foundation.
[mc4wp_form id=”48866″]