CORE12.01 at the Grand Black Sea Forum 2025: A Regional Stage for Climate-Tech Connection

From 10 to 12 December 2025, Trabzon hosted the Grand Black Sea Forum — a three-day gathering that turns one of Europe’s most diverse regional ecosystems into a single, focused conversation about innovation, entrepreneurship, and cross-border cooperation. CORE12.01 was part of it.

The Black Sea Basin connects researchers, businesses, and public institutions across a wide stretch of geography, and the Forum reflects that variety. Academia, industry, entrepreneurs, and public bodies came together to look at how knowledge moves between countries, how partnerships are built, and how innovation translates into real economic and social outcomes. For a project working to bridge research and market, it was a welcome environment.

CORE12.01’s presence at the Forum was again led by CERTH, who introduced the project to attendees and presented a dedicated CORE12.01 poster covering the project’s purpose, the structure of the Responsive Ecosystem Fellowship Programme, and the opportunity for climate-tech researchers to apply through the Open Call. Visitors could explore the project in more depth, ask questions, and connect directly with CERTH on what CORE12.01 offers and how it works.

The international and multi-stakeholder character of the Grand Black Sea Forum made it especially well suited to CORE12.01’s outreach goals. Many of the attending organisations are based in regions where research talent is strong but pan-European support pathways remain less visible. Reaching those audiences directly — through conversations, posters, and on-site introductions — is part of how the project broadens its applicant base and strengthens its presence in Widening countries.

For CORE12.01, this kind of in-person presence opens the door to long-term ecosystem links: with universities, with technology transfer offices, with entrepreneurs already thinking about commercialisation, and with public actors shaping the regional innovation landscape. Each conversation seeds the kind of network the Fellowship Programme depends on.

Participation in the Forum also fed directly into CORE12.01’s wider communication and dissemination work, helping to position the project beyond its immediate consortium networks and within active regional innovation conversations.