Early Adopters Programme
The Early Adopters programme is your incubator to help you and your partners imagine, build and launch their EBSI pilot project(s). Together, we reimagine mobility in Europe. We help citizens study, work and grow all over Europe.
Past editions
First successful cross-border pilots
Beginning of 2021, the “Early Adopters”, 21 projects from 18 European countries participated in the first pilot programme of EBSI. Each project's private and public sector partners were given early access to the pre-production environment of EBSI and were invited to develop their own pilot projects to address specific business or governmental use cases involving the exchange of verifiable credentials in the education domain.
In July 2021, 2 European universities alliances and 11 universities from 11 countries joined their forces to create the so-called “multi-University pilot” during which they identified, designed and delivered 6 cross-border scenarios, together.
Next Wave
Our ambition
Upscaling local projects and Proof of Concepts to cross-border pilots and eventually to production
What are the success criteria?
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Mobilisation of different European, national or domain actors (e.g., Authorities, Accreditation bodies, Issuers and Verifiers) towards cross-border exchange of Verifiable Credentials and interoperability -
Mobilisation of IT Service Providers (e.g., EBSI conformant digital) that enable other organisations to issue and verify VCs
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Mobilisation of end-users
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Readiness Ability to read the operational infrastructure in the pilot and production environments.
Support offered
The proposed support for the Early Adopter Programme (EAP) for the European Blockchain Services Infrastructure (EBSI) covers two tiers:
Registration of Tis & TAOs |
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Technical Q&A |
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| Custom technical advise |
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| Custom functional advise |
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| Clustering with other applicants |
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| Workshops |
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| Success stories & other publications | (Not guaranteed) |
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| Demo Day | (Not guaranteed) |
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Onboarding a use case or recognising a new schemas (*)
Scenarios overview for Tier B
From Multi-University Pilot to Life-Long Learning (OR Live, Learn and Work). Tier B – which connects to the secondary ambition of the Early Adopters Programme – focuses on applications related to Live, Learn and Work in Europe, for which seven scenarios have been identified:
Benefits of piloting with EBSI
Prepare for the future, today
By piloting and testing blockchain use cases in real-life settings and delivering cross-border services using tomorrow's educational credentials today
Build on well-known standards
Such as the European Learning Model (ELM) and Europass, which provide a solid foundation for flexible and decentralised education
Gain visibility at the European level
By showcasing pilot projects through annual Demo Days and promotional materials and being featured on the EBSI website and other digital channels.
Co-create with others across Europe
Leveraging a constantly growing network
The onboarding process
The registration process is designed to help you join the Early Adopters Programme and take advantage of the benefits it offers. The process is straightforward and consists of the following 4 steps:
1. Self-evaluation
Before considering participation in the Early Adopters Program, it is important to evaluate your organisations readiness to adopt blockchain technology and self-assess whether the program aligns with your aspirations and our ambitions, as well as the level of assistance we can provide. Additionally, it is a prerequisite for participation to be a European initiative with European actors involved.
2. Application submission
Once you have self-assess and determined EBSI is a right fit for you, you can submit your application via our application form. It is a crucial part in the registration process as it helps the EBSI team to understand your proposed use case and how it aligns with the goals of the Early Adopters Programme.
When submitting your application for the Early Adopters Program, you will need to provide detailed information about the problem you want to solve, the use case, the ecosystem that will play a part in your use case, as well as stating the level of support you would need from EBSI.
3. Application review
The assessment will consider each project's ambition, scope, and plan maturity.
- Ambition will be assessed based on whether the project aims to deliver a pilot or service, if it is cross-border, and if it commits to interoperability.
- The scope will be evaluated based on alignment with supported use case families and domains.
- Maturity will be evaluated based on the project's readiness to deliver according to its ambitions, including identifying and mobilising actors, defining required capabilities for VC exchange, and identifying IT service providers.
After evaluation, participants in the Early Adopters Program will be assigned to either Tier A or Tier B However, the EBSI Early Adopters Programme program reserves the right to disqualify any application that does not meet the criteria or is incompatible with the requirements. Please note that it may take up to a month to receive a response from the EBSI team.
4. Running process
For Tier A , only a basic support package will be offered. Applicants will then be given the tools and knowledge to proceed on their EAP journey towards the pilot environment.
For Tier B , the EAP is collaborative and structured into three stages: Discover, Design, and Build.
A. Discover stage
During the Discover stage, participants will have a kick-off meeting where they will explore the VC framework, meet other participants, and form and confirm clusters in which they will work together with their team members.
B. Design stage
In the Design stage, participants will detail the functional flow, actors, and roles of every member within their cluster. They will pitch their scenario in a group, explore EBSI specifications in detail, and design cross-border scenarios and integration plans.
C. Build stage
Finally, during the Build stage, participants will build and integrate their project in a piloting/production environment and perform a WCT. In addition, they will also have the opportunity to showcase their Live, Learn, Work pilot during the Demo Day.
