Andrew Dubber
Hi, and welcome to Inside EOSC, a podcast all about the inner workings of the European Open Science Cloud. I’m Andrew Dubber. I’m a senior researcher at the Industry Commons Foundation and a consortium member of an EOSC project called Lumen.
Now every month I introduce EOSC insiders, and you can’t get too much further inside EOSC than to sit down with a person who more or less came up with the concept and is now pretty much in charge of the whole thing. So I’m very happy to be joined today by Klaus Tochtemann, who is the president of the EOSC Association and the director of ZBW, which you’ve described as an information infrastructure for economics, and you’re a computer scientist. Information infrastructure, let’s just start there.
Andrew Dubber
Do you mean library?
Klaus Tochtermann
Yeah, that is our origin. We originally were founded 100 years ago as a research library. So we collected literatures, publications in economics. But of course, over the years, that has further developed. These days we provide, for example, publication infrastructures for scientific communities. We collect and disseminate, share research data in the field.
So it’s not only the original library tasks we are performing, it goes far beyond. And what is important, we are not a university library. We serve a national purpose. So we have to serve the entire nation in Germany.
Andrew Dubber
Okay, interesting. So you wouldn’t consider yourself a librarian, but you have leadership in that domain.
Klaus Tochtermann
Yeah, I joined ZBW as director 15 years ago. And at that time, there was a strategic decision taken by the supervisory board that the new director should be in computer science. Because it was clear that the sharing of data, the sharing of publication, the provision of publications will not be old style, like physical books, but digital.
And these days we have like 16 million downloads per year of our digital assets, as compared to maybe 200,000 accesses to our physical and printed books. But we have 4 million books, you see. So that’s more or less an archive. It’s a cultural heritage, I would say. But the users, the researchers are only using the digital offers provided by ZBW. For that reason, the supervisory board decided 15 years ago, okay, the new director should have a strong background in computer science.
Andrew Dubber
That’s really interesting. I think we’re of a similar vintage. And when I was at university in the 80s, and I was studying, briefly, economics before that turned out to be a very bad idea, it was very important that we learn at the time computer programming, because it was part of information management within an economics framework.
And, since then, it seems that computer science and economics have sort of gone different directions. The computer science is very much a deep science domain. Does this kind of bring it back into the world of how human beings function?
Klaus Tochtermann
Yeah, I think there is, I mean, economics is one term, but that’s a huge scientific discipline. And there are sub-disciplines, for example, business management. And if you look at the conference programmes in that specific area, it looks like an applied AI conference these days, meaning that information technology, digital technologies have somehow a part of these scientific communities. And also in economics, now the researchers are using data analytics in order to argue for their statements. 10 years, 15 years ago, that was very much document-based. So the people had an opinion, but could not really prove the opinion by some evidence. And, for that reason, I think information technologies is now everywhere in economics for serving the scientific purposes, for helping them to perform their science in the end.
Andrew Dubber
Now, you’re the president of the EOSC Association, and this is the Inside EOSC podcast, and you’re very much an EOSC insider. But this presidency is still quite fresh, so congratulations, I suppose.
Klaus Tochtermann
The presidency is quite fresh, that is correct. But I have been involved with the EOSC since its inception in 2015. Everything kicked off in 2015 with the first high-level expert group on the EOSC. And that was initiated after a private meeting with the former commissioner, Carlos Moedas, the former president, Karel Luyben, our EOSC envoy, the special envoy, Bob Jones, and I had a private meeting with the commissioner to talk about what we can do with respect to research data management in Europe. And one result of that was to launch the EOSC, the European Open Science Cloud.
Then I was a member of the first high-level expert group, of the second high-level expert group. I was involved in the transition phase, at which end we founded the EOSC Association. I served for four years in the board of directors, and now I moved up, so to say, to the president’s role. And I’m explaining that because there is quite some experience in that field. I consider it to be very tough if you just jump into that business from outside, without all the legacy information.
Andrew Dubber
Absolutely, there’s some momentum involved. You’ve actually been called an architect of the open science movement, which I think is a really nice phrase. But that goes back way before EOSC.
Can you talk a little bit about, because you were at Texas A&M in the 90s, doing postdoctoral research there. Can you tell us a little bit about that journey and how you sort of became, I guess, interested in open science?
Klaus Tochtermann
It goes back to 1995, when I submitted my PhD thesis. That was on, as we called it these days, hypermedia. Today, that’s the World Wide Web.
But, at that time, the World Wide Web was just in its infancy. I still remember that I had to somehow address the World Wide Web in the very last version of my PhD thesis, because it was so new, and the professors told me, okay, that’s a new development. Just make a reference to it in future work. So I did. And then that was so fascinating, because, as we called it, hypermedia these days, or the World Wide Web, only works if everything is available openly. Then at that time, I thought, okay, where is the biggest wealth of knowledge?
And these were the libraries. And, for that reason, I applied for a stipend to spend one year at Texas A&M, at the Centre for the Studies of Digital Libraries. And this is how I entered that field. And the reason was, libraries, they provide all the knowledge they have openly, back in the 90s, of course, in printed materials, primarily. So we dealt more with the open provision of the metadata, and that developed over time towards the provision of the content itself.
Andrew Dubber
Your father, Werner Tochtermann, is a very respected scientist as well. You must have been the golden child, I imagine.
Klaus Tochtermann
Yeah, we are four, frankly, and we are all somehow in the publishing market. So my sister, she’s with a big publisher. The other sister is with a publisher. My brother is at the European level involved, and I’m, well, not on the publisher side, but at the library side. So, for some reason, that developed this direction, even though my father was in a completely different field that was chemistry. But from our childhood on, we were kind of educated towards scientific purposes and sense-making activities, and that is how we four sisters and brothers ended up in different fields which are still related to one another. So my brother is a lawyer for IP rights, intellectual property rights, which is an important issue. So for us as libraries and the publishing companies.
Andrew Dubber
You’ve also looked a lot about how social media interacts with research, and particularly around the Research Alliance for Science 2.0, which you were involved in. What was sort of the most unexpected or surprising thing? Because the social media trajectory has changed quite a lot since 2012.
Klaus Tochtermann
Indeed, that was in 2012 when we founded, initiated the Leibniz Research Network Science 2.0, and we wanted to, you know, explore to what extent can scientific processes benefit from the social media movement. Because we noted that many researchers started marketing their research outputs on social media channels. There were completely new communication patterns among scientists in the social media movement.
So we kicked off that in 2012. Then the Commission at the same time also had the idea to invest into Science 2.0. But then they had to change the name, because Science 2.0, it’s licensed in the US. So you cannot use that brand for anything in Europe.
And then the term Open Science popped up. And two years later, in 2014, we also renamed our activities Open Science, which is a much broader term, because these days, research in social media related to scientific processes is not really the…
Andrew Dubber
It’s not the definition of Open Science anymore, is it?
Klaus Tochtermann
No, no, no. No, no.
Andrew Dubber
In fact, is Open… I mean, it’s an interesting question. Is social media salvageable?
Klaus Tochtermann
Is social media… ?
Andrew Dubber
Salvageable. Can we still use it in a way that we originally intended to use it for scientific purposes?
Klaus Tochtermann
It has changed quite a lot, because also the big actors are using it for their own purposes and these own purposes are not always in line with the openness, transparency and trust we have in the global science system.
Andrew Dubber
Is it a good time for openness, transparency, trust?
Klaus Tochtermann
Definitely, yeah. It is. It is, because data sovereignty, I think, is the key point. And that is also something the EOSC wants to strengthen. We are responsible for data sovereignty in Europe, and that is so important, because… And we see that at the moment at different world regions. We want the researchers to retain ownership of their data. We want researchers to have insights into the provenance of their data. Who used their data for what purpose? And in times of global crisis, as we encounter them these days, it’s more than important to have openness and transparency and provide the researchers, the scientists, a trusted environment in which they can share their data to others without fearing that their data will be misused for whatever purpose.
Andrew Dubber
Interesting. So EOSC as an idea presumably has evolved quite a lot since you first had these conversations with Moedas and Bob Jones and these people. But your leadership as president, you’ve sort of highlighted sustainable funding and stakeholder involvement and agile governance. For people who aren’t deep in the EOSC world, can you translate what those three goals will mean for the average researcher in Europe?
Klaus Tochtermann
So in the end, the purpose, the mission of the EOSC is to serve the researchers in Europe. And for that reason, they should be involved into the development process. Me as a computer scientist, I made many experiences in developing technologies which nobody needed. So we didn’t want to do the mistake again. We didn’t want to develop a technology upfront and then ask the researchers, is that what you need? So we wanted to involve them from the very beginning on the expenses of time, because that costs time. We had many discussions with the research community, but the researchers should be those defining the requirements for the EOSC or more specifically the EOSC Federation. This is why the researchers play an important role. And then of course you have the technology which is supposed to support the researchers in their scientific processes.
Sustainable funding is important, because I’m not aware of any infrastructure, of any sustainable infrastructure, which is financed based on projects. That doesn’t work.
Andrew Dubber
Because projects end.
Klaus Tochtermann
Project ends, yeah. They have a well-defined timeline. They start at some point in time, they end at some point in time, and then it’s unclear how to continue. So in order to operate an infrastructure like the EOSC Federation or the EOSC in more general, we need sustainable funding. And of course, since the technology development is taking place at such a fast pace, we need to innovate that infrastructure. The innovation can take place with project funding. And, once a project ends, some authority should decide, okay, which part of which project should be integrated into our operational infrastructure. And then of course that needs to be funded sustainably as well.
Andrew Dubber
Right. This might be the stupid question, but there are a lot of acronyms flying around in the world of European policy and European structures, but there’s also a lot of words that seem to have similar meanings, but are different organisations. Can you just, for my clarity, the difference between the EOSC Federation and the EOSC Association?
Klaus Tochtermann
Yeah, in the EOSC Association, that is where the people are. So we are a membership-based foundation under Belgian law. And institutions can become a member and each institution nominates a representative for the EOSC Association. That is where the people are.
The EOSC Federation, that is indeed the technical infrastructure developed and maintained by the people from the EOSC Association, but it’s a technical infrastructure only.
Andrew Dubber
Right. Understand. You’ve said that EOSC can serve as a global model. And I think that’s really interesting, the idea that it’s replicable, that this is something that we’ve built in Europe, that we can give as an example to other people. What other use cases do you imagine for this? Do you imagine other open science clouds or do you imagine the Federation being used for other things within Europe?
Klaus Tochtermann
Actually both, because scientific processes do not end at the borders of Europe. Science is a global system. So we interact with the scientists from all over the world, meaning that, at some point in time, EOSC could also become open to others in the sense that others can also access our data, but under our policy constraints, openness, data sovereignty and things like that.
So EOSC should become open to the world. The other dimension is to what extent can we connect EOSC to other similar initiatives? There are working groups, I would say, where regional open science cloud initiatives meet with each other. And if I say regional, I mean Africa, Australia, the US, China, Asia. And they meet with each other to discuss how can we connect our ideas to one another. And I said on purpose ideas because the technology level is so different among the different cloud solutions we have. That is really still something to be addressed in the next years, I would say. To me, EOSC is the most advanced activity worldwide.
Andrew Dubber
Is that how you negotiate the tension between openness and sovereignty? Is that you have conversations about the ideas, but not necessarily giving the technologies or the data?
Klaus Tochtermann
Among the scientists, there is a strong commitment towards open science. But it’s not only the scientists who take a final decision. It’s also the governments. And in the keynote yesterday from Robbert Dijkgraaf, we have learned that, in the US, the leading strategy is open labour markets, benefiting companies. In China, the strategy is state security, as they call it. And in Europe, it’s very much about the citizens. And that is why data sovereignty is so important to us, because we want the researchers to retain ownership of their data. So these are three different philosophies about how to deal with data. And bringing that together, not among scientists, but really at the policy level, that’s quite a challenge.
Andrew Dubber
I’m paraphrasing a little bit, but that same keynote came up the idea. I think it was along the idea of the science has ideas and visions and universities have departments and governments have ministries. I think that compartmentalisation does stand a little bit in the way of open science from an interdisciplinarity perspective. Does it make things hard?
Klaus Tochtermann
Yeah. I mean, you need some structures. Openness does not mean unstructured.
You need the structures, you need policies, and these policies have to be put in place by some authorities. We did that, for example, with the Memorandum of Understanding, which defines the terms and conditions under which the federation providers will interact with each other. And that I would see really separated from making data services openly available.
Andrew Dubber
Right. So one of our partners on the LUMEN Project, which this podcast is created for, is the KNOW Center in Austria. And you have a very long history with them and a leadership role as a scientific director. Can you tell me a little bit about that organisation and maybe give them a little bit of a push? Because I think it would be nice to celebrate them in this context.
Klaus Tochtermann
Yeah. KNOW Center. Actually, I initiated that in 2000. I was the first scientific director of the KNOW Centre. At that time, it was a competence centre for knowledge management. That was pretty much the same as we do today with data, just with knowledge. Knowledge means like company knowledge about processes, customers, suppliers. And how can we share that with others? That was the idea.
It then, over time, turned into a big data competence centre, because more and more data was available in the companies, and they wanted to use the data for their specific strategic purposes. And these days, again, the next wave is AI. It’s very much AI-based, because data, in the end, is the backbone for any artificial intelligence. You cannot do artificial intelligence without the data.
So these are the three phases the KNOW Center went through. I’m still in the supervisory board of that really great research institute based in Graz, Austria. And I have still good memories to my time back when I did. I leave… in 2010, I left Austria.
Andrew Dubber
Yeah. Well, it seems to have been an upward trajectory. But I’m wondering how you measure success, particularly in this new role as president of EOSC. How will you know you’ve done a good job?
Klaus Tochtermann
Uptake by the researchers in Europe. That’s, I think, the most important indicator. The same indicator applies for my own institution. We have a couple of success indicators. One is to what extent are our resources used by the scientific community in economics. And I mentioned earlier, most important indicator, how many downloads of our full-text publications. It’s 16 million. It used to be 800,000 10 years ago. So that’s success, I would say.
Andrew Dubber
I love that you have quantifiable metrics for this.
Klaus Tochtermann
Yeah, yeah, because I’m a computer scientist, so that’s how I think. And I think the same should apply for the EOSC. We should identify or develop together with our partners what are KPIs. We have some indicators written down in the so-called strategic research and innovation agenda. And one is, for example, how many repositories did onboard to the federation. That is an indicator, because this indicates to what extent service provider, data repository providers are, well, believing in EOSC and considering EOSC as an important distributor for their own, for example, data. So that is one.
And then, of course, the other one is the users. We have seen that in the presentation of Péter Szegedi, who is from the commission responsible for the EOSC EU Node. And he was proud of having already 4,000 users registered at the EOSC EU Node. Yeah. So that’s within one year. That’s a great achievement.
Andrew Dubber
I imagine this will be old news by the time this podcast sort of finds its way onto the internet. But yesterday, there was an announcement made, which has implications for the sustainability of EOSC. What was the announcement and what does it mean?
Klaus Tochtermann
So currently, we are discussing to what extent or how can EOSC be anchored within the next framework programme, framework programme number 10. There are several instruments available, which support different financing streams and also different governance models. One is a joint undertaking. Another one is a partnership. That is the model under which the EOSC Association is currently running. And there is no partnership as a third instrument.
No partnership would be the worst case because that means we only have funding secured through projects for two years and you cannot run and operate an infrastructure based on projects. But in theory, that is an instrument.
Then we have the joint undertakings. Joint undertakings, they have their pros and cons. They are in the joint undertakings, the voice of the community, the researchers in our case, is not well reflected in my opinion. So they will not have a strong voice because joint undertakings are very much top-down organised.
And then there is the third option, the partnership. And that is certainly a promising one. The model which is currently being discussed says the European Commission is providing cash contributions to the partnership and the member states should also provide upfront cash contributions. And now the question is…
Andrew Dubber
Sorry, should or will?
Klaus Tochtermann
From the Commission’s perspective, should. And the question is, do they will? And that is the open question. And what’s currently being discussed is the question, what does it mean, upfront contributions? Is it a commitment to financially support the sustainability of EOSC or is it really putting upfront, like from Germany, say 20 million euros for the next seven years? And that is unclear at this point in time. And that is where the negotiations take place.
Andrew Dubber
And I guess you’ll be very much involved in those conversations.
Klaus Tochtermann
Yeah, yeah. Because we have to defend and present also the position of the EOSC Association. What’s important to us is we want to have really a formal role in the future governance. We don’t want to be an external advisor to the Commission and the member states. We want to play a formal role.
Currently, in the current partnership, the EOSC Association has signed an MOU with the Commission. So there is a formal role we have in the tripartite. Tripartite also includes the member states.
And in the future governance model, the EOSC would like to keep that formal role in whatever implementation. There we are relaxed. Implementation is not that important.
The function is important.
Andrew Dubber
And I guess short timelines are not just problematic in terms of projects ending, but also in politics shifting, because you are operating very much in a political domain. I mean, I think of Carlos Moedas, who was there at the inception, is a very particular type of politician. And it seems like we’re in a kind of a very much shifting environment politically. How perilous is the environment from an open science perspective?
Klaus Tochtermann
Well, we must have a clear opinion. Why is EOSC important? And the clear message there is EOSC will ensure data sovereignty for research and innovation in Europe. EOSC will ensure data sovereignty. I think that’s the key message towards the politicians. I talked to members of the Parliament and they were very open to that because they know and they realise that these days data sovereignty is really a big issue.
I mean, you can read like every second day how the Commission is discussing, arguing with the big U.S.-based hyperscalers about what do they do with the data of the European citizens. You know, that’s a topic which really is at the nerve centre of the European politics related to data management. And if our position is support EOSC, if you support EOSC, we can ensure data sovereignty for research and not only for research, also for innovation.
Andrew Dubber
It’s interesting because the language around not just what science is for, but what anything is for within a political domain, you hear sovereignty a lot, you hear resilience, you hear preparedness. You used to hear words like progress and social development and sustainability, not in terms of economic sustainability, but in terms of climate and these sorts of things. And it seems very much the vogue has shifted towards what science is for. Is it just about positioning the language or is the movement of science for something else now?
Klaus Tochtermann
I think it’s also the movement of science. We are much more expected to provide solutions to societal challenges. When I started like 30 years ago, I could do basic research just to gain insights into a specific field. I didn’t have to justify what is the benefit of my research to anyone. And I’m also experienced that in my institute, we get evaluated every seven years and there are a couple of parameters. And one among the top three parameters is to what extent does my institute help solve societal challenges?
And the same applies for EOSC. To what extent can EOSC help to solve societal challenges? And that is a new shift. And that also has direct impact on how science functions, because if you do a fundamental research often the data of your specific discipline is sufficient to answer research questions. If you want to address societal challenges, you need data from very different fields. And that is where EOSC comes into the play.
Andrew Dubber
And also where interdisciplinarity comes into play, I imagine.
Klaus Tochtermann
Definitely. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Definitely. We have seen that during the symposium that many of the scientific use cases which were presented did come from different disciplines.
Andrew Dubber
Interesting. The counterargument to this idea of impact or usefulness of science is this challenge that it’s just solutionism. It’s not trying to experiment or come up with new ideas that we can then explore in terms of their application. It’s simply about, we have this problem, how do we fix it? Is that fair?
Klaus Tochtermann
I think there are still many research programmes or funding programmes which also support the other expectation of science, like gaining new insights. For example, in Europe the ERC grants, they serve exactly that purpose, gaining new insights and there the societal challenges do not play a primary role. We have the same in Germany where we have these grants for really radically new scientific research plus the grants for research which should have some benefit for society, policy, environment and climate. So I think it’s not the one or the other. We still have both activities within the context of EOSC and my own institution, we are more in the field of how can we help addressing societal challenges.
Andrew Dubber
Just for a bit of context, about five years ago I was part of a commissioned research for EOSC about expanding EOSC beyond academic research. How it could be used for citizen scientists, how it could be used in clinics and these sorts of things. Now lots of really interesting findings came out of that. But one of the things that came up that we tested and we got a lot of really good response to was that in addition to FAIR, this idea of Findable, Accessible, Interoperable and Reusable, that’s about the data technologies, but we should think about JUST as a sort of a companion to that, that is data practises that are Judicious, Unbiased, Safe and Transparent. I think this FAIR and JUST balance because… when we say FAIR, most people think of something different. It’s not necessarily what most human beings think of as FAIR but this idea of FAIR and just I think is a really nice balance for that.
How important are the ethics, I mean ethics are important obviously, but how important are the social impact or how important is the consideration of that in terms of the research behaviour in contributing to something that is findable, accessible and so on?
Klaus Tochtermann
That is where open science meets the FAIR movement, I would say, because in the open science movement we develop or the community, the open science community develops open methodologies, transparency, vocabularies for authors or different roles of contributors to a scientific publication for example and these are two really independent movements. When I first introduced the FAIR principles, everyone was shocked because it was unclear how does it relate to open and I told them, well FAIR data can be open but open data does not necessarily have to be FAIR. So, there is a relationship between the two and this continued. It’s still two kind of independent movements and particularly the methodologies you were referring to with the JUST activities, they are being developed within the open science movement, not by the FAIR community. The FAIR community, as you correctly noted, is dealing with the technical aspects, how can I make the data FAIR, how can I make repositories FAIR, how can I make data items FAIR, not only the data set but individual items of the data set and things like that. So, that’s more technology driven and the open science movement takes care of the methodologies which ensure transparency and openness in the scientific processes.
Andrew Dubber
The other thing that came out of that study was this idea of FAIRification, of the application of FAIR as a metric was something that was very much of interest to people outside of the academic community. What is this FAIRification, how are metrics assigned?
Klaus Tochtermann
Yeah, there are different levels or extensions to which data can be FAIR. It’s not data is FAIR or exclusive or it is not FAIR.
Andrew Dubber
It’s not a light switch.
Klaus Tochtermann
It’s a transition. Most of the data is findable. The tough part, for example, is the R, reproducible. That’s difficult and the FAIR metrics try to somehow measure to what extent is a given data set FAIR, so where is it in a scale from 1 to, I don’t know, 100. These were the first approaches towards FAIRness, so I’m 75% FAIR. That has changed a little bit recently, but that is the idea of FAIRification, so making data FAIR to a certain extent. The more FAIR it is, the more expensive it gets because reproducibility, that’s the tough part.
Andrew Dubber
You’re talking about data sets or you’re talking about technologies broadly?
Klaus Tochtermann
I’m talking about technologies making data FAIR because it doesn’t come for free.
Andrew Dubber
One final thing, it seems like, I mean, if there is a connecting thread in your biography, it seems to be about starting things, building things, making things that didn’t exist and should exist. Now they exist and then you become in charge of them. That seems to be the recurring theme for us.
Klaus Tochtermann
Nice observation, yeah.
Andrew Dubber
So it makes me wonder what you imagine might be after this.
Klaus Tochtermann
After this, well, you know, when I look back, I was never strategically planning to get engaged in knowledge management. I was never strategically planning in getting involved in social media for scientific purposes. I was never, you know, strategically planning to get into research data.
I think what I did is, or maybe I have a sense for new, exciting technologies or movements and identify them and their potential before others do that. And for that reason, I have to trust on this ability or the right word. And I don’t know what comes next. We have just experienced that with AI. I mean, AI has been around for so many years and now within two years, it’s everywhere. No one expected that.
So I cannot predict what the next big hype will be. But I have some confidence that I can early enough identify the potential of such a hype and then assess, okay, is that something for me and my professional environment to further engage in or leave it out and wait for the next wave.
Andrew Dubber
We’ve talked on this series about AI, obviously, a lot. In fact, I can’t think of a conversation I’ve had over the last two years that hasn’t been about AI in some shape or form, but also about quantum technologies, about fusion, about… what excites you as a new technology that’s maybe it’s on the horizon or it’s something that you’re looking at now as maybe that’s something that I could attach myself to.
Klaus Tochtermann
So it’s maybe not that much a technology by itself. It’s more, how can we exploit our insights we are gaining in the scientific systems outside the scientific world? So meaning in companies, in industry, because there are little connections, at least with the European Open Science Cloud and, for example, industrial engagement.
That needs to be improved over years also because all what we do in the future has to connect to the competitiveness, funds and also competitiveness expectations from the European Commission. But that is something I would really like to explore other technologies we are developing, matching the needs for companies and also the other way around. There are so many companies with great technologies and we are not aware of that.
We have heard that today in the keynote from the CIO from CERN, Enrica (Porcari). She said there are, I don’t know how many hyper colliders around the world, only 3% in science, meaning 97% of these colliders are in industrial environments. What are they doing with that? What can we learn from these activities? That is something I would be interested in. It’s not really a new technology, but how can a technology from a completely different field be applied for scientific purposes or the other way around for industrial purposes.
Andrew Dubber
That’s really interesting. The organisation I work for is called the Industry Commons Foundation. I’m very aware of the difference between the openness within the scientific community and academic research and the struggle to have an openness within across industry sectors and particularly across industry verticals.
Nobody is running on the same railway tracks, nobody is using the same kind of data and there are ways to address this. I’m interested in that connection between EOSC and industry. Is there a natural mapping? Is EOSC useful to industry?
Klaus Tochtermann
I think so in either way. For example, think of the life sciences. The data there is of great interest to industry and also the other way around. What industry is creating in terms of life science data is, of course, of great interest to EOSC. What we are developing in an infrastructure project in the German National Research Data Infrastructure is a matchmaking platform, because we experience that companies are reluctant to share their data openly. So what we developed is a marketplace where companies can at least kind of promote or provide information of the data and then the researchers cannot directly access the data, but they get in contact with the companies and then they make bilateral agreements and we are, so to say, the matchmaking provider, we bring the two together.
I think that is as far as we can get at the moment, also because of the high competition between the companies. And I can fully understand that they don’t want to openly share the data they have created over the last, I don’t know how many years, but that could be an approach to bring together for the benefit of either side, the company and the scientists, the two to work on the same data set.
Andrew Dubber
To finish off, we’re at a conference now, there are 500 people in the room, all gathered together around an idea that you had. That must be very gratifying.
Klaus Tochtermann
Yeah, and stressy, frankly. You invest much of your time in webinars, video conferences, it’s a huge communication effort. It’s a huge communication effort and we really want to have a participatory process also in developing the future governance of the EOSC. We don’t want to do it among the board of directors or the president alone with the secretary-general. We want our partners to get involved in that process for how to shape the future of the EOSC Association. And for that reason, we will launch really a participatory process next year.
And that’s communication, communication, communication with the different stakeholder groups. They all have their different perspectives, needs, expectations. And in the end, I hope we will have a result which is supported by the entire community.
Andrew Dubber
Well, on behalf of everyone here, congratulations and thank you. And thank you for the interview. Klaus Tochtermann, it’s been great to have you on the programme.
Klaus Tochtermann
Thank you very much.
Andrew Dubber
That’s Klaus Tochtermann, president of the EOSC Association and the director of ZBW. And that’s Inside EOSC, a podcast from LUMEN, which receives funding from the European Union’s Horizon Research and Innovation Programme.
I’m Andrew Dubber and I’m back next month with an interview with another EOSC insider. You can subscribe to Inside EOSC wherever you listen to podcasts. I believe you can also give it five stars, leave a review, post about it on social media or send it to friends and work colleagues.
Very grateful for any and all of those things. Thanks for listening. Talk soon.
And we’re done.
Klaus Tochtermann
Perfect. That was good. It was like talking. It was not an interview and it’s like…
Andrew Dubber
I like to do a little bit of research myself.