On 1 February the European Commission announced the launch of a new EU Blockchain Observatory and Forum.
The aims of the Observatory are to:
- map key existing blockchain initiatives in Europe and beyond;
- monitor blockchain developments, analyse trends and address emerging issues;
- become a knowledge hub on blockchain;
- promote European blockchain actors and reinforce European engagement with multiple stakeholders;
- be a communications channel to set out the EU’s vision and ambition with respect to blockchain on the international scene; and
- inspire common actions based on specific blockchain use-cases of European interest.
The Commission has selected ConsenSys as its partner to support the Observatory’s work, following a call for tenders launched in 2018.
This is the latest EU initiative focused on blockchain. It builds on other recent developments.
- The European Commission has been funding EU blockchain projects since 2013 and has announced it will commit up to €340 million on blockchain projects between 2018 and 2020.
- It has launched a €5 million prize for “Blockchains for Social Good”, open until 2019. The challenge is to develop scalable, efficient and high-impact decentralised solutions to social innovation challenges leveraging DLT.
- On 19 January 2018, the Commission closed its call for tender on a feasibility study to assess the opportunity to pilot a EU Blockchain Infrastructure (EuroChain) for the advent of an “open, innovative, trustworthy, transparent, and EU-law compliant” data and transactional environment. The study will start in the second quarter of 2018.