The vision for EOSC, recognised as the Common European Data Space for Research and Innovation, is to put in place a ‘system of systems’ to find and access data and services for research and innovation in Europe. This is to help researchers store, share, process, analyse and reuse FAIR research outputs within and across disciplines and borders.

The deployment of a network between data repositories and services is instrumental for Open Science to progress in Europe. For this, the EOSC Federation of Nodes has been created and will continue to grow.

In March 2025 the build-up phase of the EOSC Federation kicked off in Brussels. The Federation was launched in November 2025 and entered operations with 14 production-grade nodes on 08 October 2026.


EOSC FEDERATION

Recognised by the EU as the Common European Data Space for Research and Innovation, the EOSC Federation will grow to accommodate dozens of EOSC Nodes that are interconnected and can collaborate to share and manage scientific data, knowledge, and resources within and across thematic and geographical research communities.

The European research organisations behind the EOSC Nodes have been working together with the EOSC Tripartite to shape the Federation since March 2025 as part of the Build-up Group.

The EOSC Nodes are entry points for users to the EOSC Federation, with each node offering its own and possibly third-party services, including data reposing and accessing services.

To enable the establishment and sustainability of such a distributed system, many questions are in the process of being answered:

  • What are the requirements for an entity to become an EOSC Node?
  • How will the EOSC Federation be governed?
  • What are the financial mechanisms that will support the resource transactions within the EOSC Federation?

The EOSC Tripartite Governance has recognised that answering those questions is of paramount importance for all parties to come to an agreement on realistic scenarios for EOSC’s post-2027 governance and funding models.

EOSC NODES
ROLE OF THE TRIPARTITE GROUP
SCIENTIFIC USE CASES
EOSC FEDERATION
EOSC FEDERATION