The Next Generation Internet projects NGI Sargasso and NGI Search have signed an agreement (Memorandum of Understanding, or MoU) to formally join forces and support each other’s aspiration to shape a more human-centric Internet for our future generations.

NGI Search aims to fund open source projects in the area of Next Generation Internet Search, Discovery and Indexing with focus on European values. Specifically this means open source alternatives that are privacy preserving and trustworthy and contribute to the evolution of the Internet according to a human-centric approach of the Internet commons. This mission is aligned NGI Sargasso‘s ambition to create a unique collaborative ecosystem to harvest EU-US and/or EU-Canada technology breakthroughs to revolutionize the Next Generation Internet technologies, services and standards, and contribute to the evolution of the Internet also according to a human-centric approach of the Internet commons.

This agreement is based on collaborating on joint actions and cross-dissemination activities to strengthen the Next Generation Internet ecosystem in Europe and beyond, and was born in the Open Search Symposium 2024 (OSSYM24), where our partners Sara Abu and Laura Argilés from AUSTRALO met the NGI Search Coordinator Mirko Presser from the Aarhus University, as you can see in the picture below.

NGI Sargasso is also collaborating with StandICT.eu, FORGING, and CrabNebula through MoUs.

About NGI Search: The Next Generation Internet Search Incubator

The NGI Search project is a European project designed to support entrepreneurs, tech-geeks, developers, and socially engaged people, who are capable of challenging the way we search and discover information and resources on the internet.

This is a difficult, yet very important field of research, development and innovation, as today, users of the internet are mostly relying on services provided by non-transparent organizations potentially violating privacy and trust.

With five European partners contributing to the project, NGI Search launched five open calls for innovative projects, whereby selected applicants benefitted from the financial support of up to 150,000€ as well as technical, business and innovation support over 12 months, to develop solutions that change the way we use and experience, search and discover data and resources in general on the internet and on the web. This includes:

  • A new voice and image-based user interfaces for searching and representing data.
  • Heterogeneous data sources include IoT, semantic data, multimedia, social media and traditional websites.
  • New Machine Learning (ML) and Natural Language Processing (NLP) methodologies in a generic context.
  • Specific use cases such as industry 4.0, health, social media, etc.

The NGI Search consortium is coordinated by Aarhus University, and partnered by FundingBox, The University of Murcia, Linknovate Science, and OW2.

About the Next Generation Internet (NGI) Initiative

The Next Generation Internet (NGI) is a European Commission (EC) initiative that aims to shape the development and evolution of the Internet into an Internet of Trust. An Internet that responds to people’s fundamental needs, including trust, security, and inclusion, while reflecting the values and the norms all citizens enjoy in Europe.

After an initial EC investment in NGI research and innovation of more than €250M (2018-2020) that supported more than 1,000 Internet researchers and innovators involved in hundreds of projects, the EC announced renewed EU funding for NGI under Horizon Europe. Horizon Europe Calls related to the Next Generation Internet, of relevance to the NGI community are listed under Pillar II, Global Challenges and European Industrial Competitiveness, Cluster 4, Digital, Industry and Space. This funding goes beyond financing: it includes mentoring and supports the innovators’ journey from an idea to a real business.