BRNO — The 2025 National Tripartite Event (NTE) of the Czech Republic took place in Brno on 21 May 2025, as part of the Research Data Days. The event featured a panel discussion dedicated to the future of EOSC along with several sessions on data-related topics that highlighted activities of Czech actors, with special emphasis on the role of Artificial Intelligence and research infrastructures.
Organised by CESNET, Masaryk University, the Technical University of Ostrava and e-INFRA CZ, the event underscored the Czech Republic’s interest in contributing to the success of the EOSC Federation’s build-up phase, and reaffirmed the commitment of Czech institutions to advancing Open Science.
Discussing the future of EOSC
The panel discussion on the future of EOSC and the input of the Czech Republic took center stage at the NTE, sparking a lively debate moderated by Jan Hrušák from the Czech Academy of Sciences.
The panel was opened by Yannis Rodopoulos from the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Research and Innovation. Rodopoulos updated the audience on the ongoing discussions on the future governance of EOSC. He noted that on this topic there remains much to be decided, as the final model will depend on the division of responsibilities and financial commitments between the European Commission, EU Member States, and the scientific community. He described how a consensus is emerging around the need to “upgrade” the current Tripartite governance by establishing a legal entity to take care of the operational aspects of the EOSC Federation.
Next, EOSC-A Director Kamran Naim presented the Opinion Paper of the EOSC-A Board of Directors, which details a proposal on the potential governance and financing model for EOSC after 2027. The topic will be addressed in full during the 10th General Assembly of the EOSC Association in Antwerp, Belgium on 27-28 May 2025.
The view of the Czech Government was presented by Lucie Núñez Tayupanta from the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports. The Ministry is doing its share to help the Czech Republic “get in shape” for the EOSC Federation, which the government sees as an essential tool for coordinating Member States in establishing Open Science as the new normal. Around €140 million will be invested to create a Czech EOSC Node, develop the national data infrastructure, and create domain-specific repositories.
The second phase of the national programme is set to make the plans more concrete, in particular regarding the development of research infrastructures in cooperation with e-INFRA CZ, as pointed out by Matej Antol, Executive Director of CERIT SC at Masaryk University.
Finally, Luděk Matyska, Scientific Director of CERIT SC at Masaryk University and Chair of the EOSC-CZ Steering Committee–referred to by the moderator as “the soul of EOSC in the Czech Republic”-–identified the project National Repository Platform (NRP) for research data as the country’s most important contribution to EOSC, emphasising the importance of underlying physical infrastructure for scientific knowledge exchange. The upcoming OSII project (Open Science II), currently in the preparatory stage, will further support the creation of a FAIR data ecosystem by connecting individual repositories. Matyska highlighted the role of the EOSC Federation as the umbrella under which scientific communities should be placed. He stressed that the participation of the scientific community is crucial to achieve this goal.
Research infrastructures: Enablers of data-driven science
In the discussion that followed, Núñez Tayupanta and Matyska detailed the Czech Republic’s key contributions to a FAIR data landscape, highlighting government measures to ensure stakeholder engagement through a bottom-up approach, and the need to work with research infrastructures as the main contributors of data and services. Antol further indicated the success so far in bringing together communities with diverse languages, including scientists, technical experts, and policy makers to foster mutual understanding in data-related topics, and the creation of domain-specific repositories.
Naim stressed that collaboration among the Nodes in the Federation, similar to thematic nodes formed by research infrastructures, will be key to unlocking the full potential of the EOSC Federation. In this regard, the experience of the first wave of EOSC Nodes will provide useful insight for the continued development of the Federation and its evolution into the envisioned “system of systems.”
Speaking form the European Commission’s perspective, Rodopoulos confirmed the awareness of the need to reduce fragmentation of research infrastructures to ensure their sustainability. The Commission plans to keep its role as a provider of the framework within which actors in the research landscape operate, while also taking into account the priorities of EU Member States to establish its lines of action. This will be relevant in the negotiations for the next Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF), which will determine the scope and position of Horizon Europe’s successor (FP10), and the EOSC Federation within it.
