CR14 being part of NATO’s DIANA first challenge

“CR14 is thrilled to be a part of NATO’s DIANA and to be chosen as one of the official test centres for cyber-defence testing,” said Siim Alatalu, the CEO of CR14. “And we are excited to collaborate with NATO and the best and brightest innovators across the Alliance to design cutting-edge technological solutions to specific defence and security challenges,” he added.

This significant step forward was recently achieved after the DIANA Board of Directors agreed to include an additional 28 deep-tech test centres in several Allied countries and two additional start-up accelerator sites in North America.

David Van Weel, NATO’s Assistant Secretary-General for Emerging Security Challenges and DIANA’s interim Managing Director, welcomed these additions, stressing that “the diverse geographic locations of these sites will enable us to collaborate with the best and brightest innovators across the Alliance to design cutting-edge technological solutions to specific defence and security challenges”.

Starting in autumn 2023, DIANA will implement its first challenge programmes in cooperation with the following accelerator sites, pending conclusion of the necessary contractual arrangements:

• Tehnopol in Tallinn;
• Officine Grandi Riparazioni (OGR) in Turin;
• BioInnovation Institute (BII) in Copenhagen;
• MassChallenge in Boston;
• Pacific Northwest Mission Acceleration Center (PN MAC) in Seattle.

A call for innovator-participants for DIANA’s pilot challenge programmes will be issued in mid-2023. Up to 30 challenge awardees will be selected to participate. The number of challenges and awardees will grow yearly until the programme is fully operational in 2025. DIANA’s transatlantic accelerator (view latest sites map) and test centre network (view latest map) will also continue to grow.

Check the map of accelerators here

Check the map test-centres here