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Discover our working group
Working Group 4 builds its work on the premise that SMEs are the backbone of the European cybersecurity industry and that European regions play a fundamental part in structuring the European cybersecurity ecosystem. The key aims are to increase the visibility of the European cybersecurity SMEs outside their traditional home markets, as well as support the inter-regional cooperation and the implementation of the regional smart commercialisation strategies.
Mission & Objectives
- Provide recognition and visibility to the European cybersecurity companies.
- Facilitate cooperation among Europe’s regional authorities and EU policy makers to exchange good practices and improve the competitiveness of local cybersecurity start-ups and SMEs.
- Stimulate a pan-European network of sales to develop the marketing skills of the local cybersecurity start-ups and SMEs and to accelerate their competitiveness at the European level.
- Raise awareness of the need to improve and deploy cybersecurity solutions for SME as users.
Ongoing work
- Coordinating activities between regions, clusters and local governmental bodies (e.g. smart cities) to support the establishment of the European Digital Innovation Hubs (EDIHs).
- Building and further developing market-oriented initiatives that provides marketing and visibility opportunities to the European cybersecurity start-ups and SMEs.
Our achievements

Boosting Interregional collaboration
- Interreg Europe CYBER
- Smart Specialisation Platform ‘ CYBER SMART REGIONS” and network of Cybersecurity DIHs: aims to develop interregional cooperation in order to: create synergies among the existing specialized regions in cybersecurity, facilitate the development of EU cybersecurity value chain, address the challenges that hamper commercialisation of existing and new products and services in Europe, foster business investment on cybersecurity.
- Cyber Smart Regions mapping exercise ( 520 companies, > 1500 products and services). This is one of the main tools for testing the taxonomy. The production of a structured platform and the need to understand how local ecosystem are structured has developed many concepts supporting the structure and the implementation of the taxonomy. This is a joint tool to visualise and analyse the cybersecurity value chain has been designed and implemented to map the existing regional ecosystems within the five regions: Brittany, Castilla y Leon, Luxembourg, North-Rhine Westphalia, Estonia.

Support to SMEs
- CYBERSECURITY MADE IN EUROPE Label: Serves as a marketing tool to help European companies to increase their visibility on the market and raise the awareness of the strategic value and trustworthiness of cybersecurity companies originating in Europe.
- Cybersecurity STARtup Award: Provides recognition and market support to the most promising European cybersecurity start-ups and SMEs that delivers groundbreaking cybersecurity solutions. The Award leverages ECSO Cyber Investors Days, a well-established cybersecurity business matchmaking event.