Photo credits: Peter Gunnebro

From November 22 to 24, 2022, aconium and the partners of the Interreg project for the North Sea region CORA and COM³ met in Lincoln, United Kingdom, to present project results and to exchange views on future activities.

The two Interreg projects for the North Sea region, CORA and COM³, aim to reduce the digital divide in rural areas and create a fair digital future. At the meeting in Lincoln, partners in both projects discussed the latest progress.

In the CORA project, for example, a series of workshops was launched in autumn with the aim of sensitizing and inspiring employees in municipalities and providing them with practical knowledge and concrete guidelines on various topics relating to digital transformation in rural areas of the North Sea region. This includes building digital skills in administration and among the population as well as creating digital infrastructures in areas such as health, administration, mobility and business. In this context, aconium GmbH organized an informative workshop on the topic of “Integrated strategy, KPIs and financing”.

Over the coming months, the CORA project will create 50 individual digital strategies and projects in the neighboring municipalities of the partner cities that will contribute to the digital transformation of their region.

In the COM³ project, the “COM³ model” was introduced. It is an easy-to-follow guide that will help employees and developers in municipalities, regions and economic development organizations to make local companies technology-enabled. The development of further training solutions for building a digital entrepreneurial ecosystem in rural areas was also discussed.

A number of e-learning modules are already freely available on the learning platform www.ruraldigital.eu:

The COM³ partners will develop further training solutions by June 2023 and share the results of their nine innovative pilot projects in the North Sea region.

Background to CORA and COM³

Together with partners from Belgium, the Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, the United Kingdom and Germany, aconium is developing measures and training solutions in the CORA and COM³ projects that will enable all citizens, small and medium-sized enterprises and administrations to acquire the necessary digital skills.

Together with the lead partner Intercommunale Leiedal, Belgium, aconium GmbH coordinates the project, communication and financial management activities and is involved in the development of the project methodology and training solutions in collaboration with the scientific partners.