ECB seeks partners for digital euro innovation workstreams

The European Central Bank has invited expressions of interest from public and private organisations to join innovation workstreams that will test technical solutions and practical use cases for a potential digital euro across the euro area.

The call targets entities able to contribute targeted experiments and prototypes addressing payments functionality, security, resilience and integration with existing financial infrastructure. The ECB has identified themes including offline payments, programmability, user privacy safeguards, interoperability with payment service providers and tokenisation applications.

Applicants must describe technical capabilities and proposed contributions so the ECB and participating national central banks can select collaborators for time-limited workstreams. Selected partners will work with ECB teams to develop and test specific features under controlled conditions and deliver findings to inform future design and operational planning.

The workstreams will be structured as a sequence of experiments and prototypes rather than procurement contracts, with an emphasis on learning, interoperability testing and identifying implementation challenges. Expected participants include technology firms, payment service providers, commercial banks, market infrastructure operators, research organisations and national central banks.

Outputs will be published in aggregate to share lessons while protecting confidential information. The bank clarified that the expression-of-interest process is separate from any decision to issue a digital euro and does not guarantee participation in later pilots or procurement.

The initiative follows several years of ECB research and preparatory work. The bank has previously stated that any issuance would complement cash and existing electronic payment methods and allow the public to continue holding central bank money in digital form. Findings from the workstreams will feed into the bank’s assessment of whether to move to wider pilots or issuance.

Central banks worldwide are examining how digital currencies affect payment systems, privacy and financial stability. The ECB’s request aims to provide practical evidence to answer technical questions and guide possible next steps in the digital euro project.