To make the EU the place where AI excellence thrives from the lab to the market, the European Union is setting up world-class Testing and Experimentation Facilities (TEFs) for AI.
Together with Member States, the Commission is co-funding the TEFs to support AI developers to bring trustworthy AI to the market more efficiently, and facilitate its uptake in Europe. TEFs are specialised large-scale reference sites open to all technology providers across Europe to test and experiment at scale state-of-the art AI solutions, including both soft-and hardware products and services, e.g. robots, in real-world environments.
The selected TEFs projects started on January 1st 2023. They focus on the following high-impact sectors:
- Agri-Food: project "agrifoodTEF"
- Healthcare: project "TEF-Health"
- Manufacturing: project "AI-MATTERS"
- Smart Cities & Communities: project "Citcom.AI"
Co-funding between the European Commission (through the Digital Europe Programme) and the Member States will support the TEFs for five years with budgets between EUR 40-60 million per project.
TEFs can also contribute to the implementation of the Artificial Intelligence Act by supporting regulatory sandboxes in cooperation with competent national authorities for supervised testing and experimentation.
TEFs will be an important part of building the AI ecosystem of excellence and trust to support Europe's strategic leadership in AI.