The Commission has opened a third set of calls for proposals worth over €240 million under the digital strand of the Connecting Europe Facility (CEF) to strengthen the deployment of ultra-fast, secure and sustainable digital infrastructures.
The CEF Digital programme will contribute to the development of Gigabit and5G networks,as well as to boosting the capacity and resilience ofdigital backbone infrastructures and the digitalisation of transport and energy networks.
This new set of calls includes 5G coverage along transport Corridors (€100 million); 5G and Edge Cloud for Smart Communities (€51 million); and backbone connectivity for Digital Global Gateways (€90 million).
The first two calls focus on improving 5G connectivity throughout rural communities and urban areas, to ensure that all EU citizens have access to digital technologies and services. The calls also support the development of 5G infrastructure along European transport corridors, for example to support road-safety services and provide gigabit connectivity services to vehicles users and passengers, while ensuring 5G/cloud edge integration.
Through the Digital Global Gateways call, CEF Digital will support backbone connections, mainly via submarine cables, to improve the performance and resilience of connectivity networks in islands and seaside regions, as well as in remote, outermost and sparsely populated areas, and between the EU and third countries. This is key to increase the capacity and resilience of the Union’s digital networks, in line with the EU’s Global Gateway strategy.
The development of widespread and high-quality connectivity is one of the targets of the Digital Decade, which will also enable the EU to reach important digital objectives, such as the need to speed up the deployment and take up of edge cloud nodes, among others.
The deadline to apply to these calls for proposals is 17 January 2024. More information on the application, evaluation, and award process for this set of calls will be available at the online info day on 26 October.
Source: European Commission
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