The Europen Cluster Collaboration Platform is embedded within the European Cluster Excellence Initiative and financed by the Competitiveness and Innovation Programme, since it is an instrument provided by DG Enterprise & Industry to enable cluster organizations to actively play a role on the international cluster arena. This can be achieved either through a professional presentation of their activities/members, through a dynamic interaction in virtual or personal dialogue with peers in communities or through accessing structured cluster information and using it to become better. “Striving for excellence” represents the mindset of those cluster people who intend to bring their clusters to an excellent level of performance. Some of them are at the beginning of this process, some of them already advanced, but it is this shared spirit that makes their getting together on/through the platform that creates a win-win situation.

This brand new online portal rich in features and information has been developed aiming to build communication bridges between cluster players from the same or a different sector. The ultimate goal is to facilitate cluster cooperation, both between cluster organizations, as well as between cluster members (i.e. companies, R&D institutions, other players).

The ECCP is a user-driven instrument. The basis for its development lies in the results of the largest European survey among cluster organizations and cluster policy makers. 420 cluster players provided detailed input regarding their expectations from such an online portal that were considered in the technical development . However, the platform must keep the pace with the changes in the needs of the users in order to make it useful over a long period of time and for this it is vital that ideas for improvement coming from users should be permanently provided and considered.