Innovation thrives when expertise, experience, and collaboration come together - a principle clearly demonstrated at the ITEA PO Days 2025 in Estoril, Portugal. Over 300 participants from 19 countries gathered on 16, 17 and 18 September to explore more than 80 project ideas, form partnerships, and prepare proposals for ITEA Call 2025. The event also highlighted the concrete societal and business impact of the recently completed and running ITEA RD&I projects.

Celebrating excellence

The first day set the tone with the ITEA Awards of Excellence, hosted by ITEA Vice-chairman Régis Cazenave. Four projects were recognised for their outstanding achievements. EXPLAIN, IWISH, and IML4E were honoured for their achievements in the categories Innovation, Business impact, and Standardisation, respectively. SIGNET received the award for Exceptional Excellence for its remarkable results across all three categories. These awards underscored how ITEA projects translate pioneering ideas into solutions with measurable benefits for society. We invite you to learn more about these award-winning projects!

Innovation in action

The energy continued across the three-day event, where the participants learned a lot from the plenary sessions, and actively engaged in the B2B session, the project idea poster session, and workgroup discussions, with the goal to create new partnerships and transform ideas into innovative proposals. The 55+ project ideas presented in the interactive poster session were refined through the many lively workgroup sessions. This resulted in 25 intermediate and final project idea presentations.
The event was also attended by Public Authorities from ten countries, who provided guidance on national priorities, funding outlook and eligibility criteria.

We decided to submit our idea to the ITEA platform to spark discussions around a technical topic we believe is crucial for our societies and economies. As a small SME, it was our first time joining the ITEA PO Days, and we’re very happy with that decision. The event was well organised, informative, and supported by the continuously helpful ITEA team. The newcomers' workshop quickly brought us up to speed. Thanks to the guidance, we were able to build a strong consortium and form collaborations that already extend beyond the project proposal itself. We truly appreciated the warm atmosphere and great hospitality in Estoril, and we’ll definitely be joining again next year, wherever it takes place!

- Mahmoud Ameen and Roel Blomjous from Dutch SME Wattvise

As always, international engagement remained strong. While the Netherlands, Germany, and Portugal led European attendance, large delegations from Canada, Estonia, and South Korea highlighted ITEA’s global reach. The growing appeal of the ITEA Community was also reflected in the fact that 51% of the participants were newcomers. To help these first-time participants navigate the event, a dedicated Newcomers’ workshop was organised. Inspiration on what can be achieved through an ITEA project could be found at the exhibition ‘Highlights of the ITEA impact’, which showcased 34 ongoing and recently completed ITEA projects.

Preparing for success

The success of the event was strengthened by the preparation in the weeks leading up to Estoril. An online preparation session, thirteen country information webinars, and two online pitch sessions with 58 project ideas enabled participants to familiarise themselves with the project ideas, connect with potential partners, and plan strategic collaborations in advance. The ITEA Project idea tool provided early access to more than 80 project ideas, clustered by ITEA’s key domains. This year, particularly Smart Industry and Smart Engineering were well represented with 19 and 16 proposals.

Overall, participants rated the event 4.3 out of 5.0, confirming the value of the ITEA PO Days. For those who could not attend, recordings and presentations are available online, and the ITEA Project idea tool (subject to NDA) remains accessible via the PO Days website to explore project ideas and contact project idea leaders. In this overview you can see what kind of partners or expertise the projects in preparation are still looking for.

The ITEA PO Days 2025 demonstrated that success in innovation comes from connecting ideas and expertise in an open, collaborative environment. With ITEA Call 2025 now open, these connections are set to spark new innovations that will impact daily life.

 Deadline for PO submission: 10 November – 17:00 CET

Check the ITEA Call 2025 Calendar