A Snapshot of StandICT.eu 2029 OC#1 Fellowships
StandICT.eu Open Call #1 ran from 16 November 2025 to 17 January 2027 and received a record 165 fellowship applications. In total, 75 fellowships were selected, amounting to 657 482€ in direct funding. Moreover, the funded applications received an average quality score of 8,2 (on a 1 to 10 scale), and the threshold for approved applications was 7.29.
The selected fellowships contribute to the development of international ICT standards on strategic ICT areas that are framed within the Rolling Plan for ICT standardisation published and revised annually by the European Commission. In Batch #1, the tackled horizontal and vertical ICT topics are distributed across the five key areas as follows:
- Foundational drivers: 13 fellowships focusing on Cybersecurity (10 fellowships), and Data economy (3).
- Key enablers and security: 27 fellowships focusing on Artificial Intelligence (15 fellowships), 5G/6G (2), Accessibility of ICT (2), Data interoperability (1), Electronic identification (4), Internet of Things (2), and Quantum technologies (1).
- Innovation for Digital Single Market: 16 fellowships focusing on Blockchain and DLT (12 fellowships), Web 4.0 and virtual worlds (3), Retail payments (1).
- Sustainable growth: 15 fellowships focusing on Circular Economy, including Digital Product Passport (5), Construction building information modelling (2), Robotics and autonomous systems (1), Smart and sustainable cities (5), and ICT Environmental impact (1).
- Societal challenges: 15 fellowships focusing on Digital health, healthy living and ageing (2), digital skills (1), and digital learning (1).
Fellowship Profiles and infographics
The funded experts span a broad geographic spectrum across 16 EU and associated countries, with the majority hailing from France (18 fellowships), Spain (12), and Germany (11). They represent different organisational types, including SMEs (37%), IT consultancy/Development (23%), large enterprises (3%), Academia and Research (21%), associations (4%), Government and public services (7%), and standardisation organisations or national standardisation bodies (5%).
25% of the funded experts are women, and the remaining 75% are men or prefer not to disclose their gender. Moreover, 35% of the selected fellows are new to the StandICT.eu programme.
The funded fellows hold different positions within the targeted working group or technical committee. 29% have a leadership role as (co-) chair or (co-) convenor, while the remainder act as contributing expert members (25 fellowships), project leaders (10), editors (10), standards authors (6) or group secretaries (2).
Engaged SDOs, Organisations and European Projects
67% of the fellows’ activities contribute to the activities of Committees or Working Groups operating in global SDOs, including ISO/IEC, ISO, IEC, ITU, IEEE, W3C / ERCIM and IETF, while the remainder works with European Standardisation Organisations (ESOs), covering CEN, CEN/CENELEC and ETSI, or with international standardisation associations, including OASIS, 3GPP and UN/CEFACT.
Monitoring of Batch #1 fellowships began in March 2026. Upon completion of activities, their profiles are featured on the Fellows page, and their contributions are included in the EUOS repository.
