As announced at the last Steering Committee meeting and building on the extensive expertise and practical experience gained from more than 10 years of developing Smart Specialisation Strategies (S3), DG REGIO has announce at the end of February,  the launch of the Smart Specialisation Community of Practice (S3 CoP), DG REGIO’s main source of support and knowledge sharing on the implementation of Smart Specialisation Strategies.

The work of the S3 CoP will build on the experiences of existing Partnerships, drawing lessons from the past to address emerging and future needs of your regions and stakeholders. In practical terms, the S3 Community of Practice will carry out a wide range of activities to support all S3 thematic platforms and Thematic Smart Specialisation Partnerships (TSSPs), providing services such as:

• An up-to-date website on the overall activities of the platform and partnerships.
• The hosting of steering committee meetings.
• Support to new and existing TSSPs including, among others:

1. guidance material for all stages of collaborations.
2. monitoring and analysis of partnerships and their activities.
3. tailored service provision to the partnerships (e.g. support for governance models, (re)scoping, smart partnering, search for funding assistance, support to scale-up).

• Peer learning opportunities and cross-cutting analyses.

In addition, the S3 CoP will also host the Expression of Interest (EoI) for regions and stakeholders to start a new Partnership for Interregional Collaboration. The EoI will be open continuously, with two cut-off dates per year. In 2023, the first cut-off date will be in April, whilst the second will take place in September.

To facilitate planning and engagement of stakeholders, the S3 CoP has published a tentative (non-exhaustive) timeline with the key foreseen activities for the year 2023:

• 30 March 2023: launch of the S3 Community of Practice featuring the support to be provided to existing and new Partnerships. The new call for Expression of Interest (EoI) to new Partnerships will be launched at this occasion.
• April 2023: dedicated follow-up with support experts on partnerships’ needs, to initiate the service provision.  Also first deadline for call for the Expression of Interest for new Partnerships.  
• May/June 2023: first Steering Committee meeting, together with Interregional Cooperation Working Group meeting.  
• September 2023: second deadline for call for the Expression of Interest for new Partnerships.  
• November 2023: second Steering Committee meeting.

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Registration for the S3 CoP launching event (available until 29 March): https://s3-conference.regio-events.eu/

S3CoP secretariat contact (by IDEA Consult): contact@s3-cop.eu

S3 CoP Twitter: @S3Cop_EU

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