The Steering Committee of the S3 Thematic Partnerships within the S3 Community of Practice (S3 CoP) met on 18–19 September to review the achievements of the past three years under the current consortium. The meeting focused on the delivery of services over recent months and included breakout sessions to exchange experiences across different services and platforms.

Els van de Velde presented a summary of the main results and insights from the S3 CoP Thematic Platforms:

• 4 S3 Thematic Platforms, joining 43 Thematic Smart Specialisation Partnerships (TSSPs) from 182 NUTS2 regions.
• 6 Steering Committee meetings held.
• 8 expert services offered and 110 services delivered to TSSPs.
• A dedicated S3 CoP website, featuring updated webpages for each partnership and 34 testimonials on regional collaboration and lessons learned.
• A call for expressions of interest that resulted in 15 submissions and 10 new partnerships.

Giulia Bergui then shared insights from the latest monitoring reports, highlighting key performance indicators:

• 35 monitoring reports, 341 EU projects launched (including 32 in the last six months) and 1,502 active partners engaged — including universities, technology centres, cluster organisations, and companies.

The main challenges identified include:

• Partner engagement (motivation, political support, commitment),
• Funding and governance (lack of dedicated budget, reliance on voluntary contributions, leadership rotation),
• Strategic alignment and knowledge gaps (limited awareness of S3 and TSSP concepts, misalignment between regional/national funding schemes, and limited cross-regional recognition).

The meeting also included a presentation on the I3 Instrument and its opportunities, alongside an overview of the services provided by the I3 Support Facility.

Across both days, breakout sessions allowed participants to share experiences, discuss the added value of service delivery, and exchange views on how to improve future support in line with TSSP needs.

The Traceability & Big Data partnership presented its experience with the most recent expert service, Demonstration, prompting an open discussion on challenges and opportunities in this area.

The final session was devoted to platform exchanges. The Sustainable Blue Economy platform held a dedicated session, while the Energy, Industrial Modernisation, and Agrifood partnerships met in breakout rooms grouped by leadership type — one for cluster-led and another for RTO/region-led partnerships — to share perspectives and future visions.

This was the final Steering Committee meeting organised by the current S3 CoP consortium. The European Commission’s procurement process has selected a new consortium to manage the S3 CoP, expected to start in November 2025.