What does a European, independent search infrastructure look like – beyond the ubiquitous Google search? This is precisely the subject of the Deutschlandfunk Kultur report, in which our project plays a prominent role.
In a short guest comment, Dr. Stefan Voigt from the board of the Open Search Foundation characterizes the concept of the Open Web Search Initiative as follows
“To inspire Europe to build its own web search infrastructure – based on a publicly accessible web index on which a wide variety of search engines and front-ends can be created.”
Journalist Stefan Mey discusses the Open Web Index as a foundational technology for a European sovereign web infrastructure in the podcast.
Google’s quasi-monopoly and the failure of alternative providers to date highlight the need for new solutions.
The independent index should serve as a basis for AI training and as a partner index for search engines.
It’ll form a landscape of different providers from universal search engines to specialized search engines on “nerd topics”.
The podcast also discusses the current status of the project, the question of funding and the importance of an open search index as part of Europe’s critical digital infrastructure.
Listen to the whole podcast at Deutschlandfunk:
https://www.deutschlandfunkkultur.de/zutritt-verboten-eu-diskutiert-altersbeschraenkungen-fuer-social-media-100.html
By the way: Jan Penfrat from EDRi (European
“Imagine, our streets would have no names and our houses no readable house numbers. Just a cryptic code readable only by machines.”
Dr. Stefan Voigt, Chairman of the OSF Board, explains the mission of the Open Search Foundation and the goal of the Open Web Index project in an interview for the Polish web blog HomoDigital.
He goes into more detail about the challenges and the great importance of the project in current political, social and technological context.
“So one of the main challenges is to inspire people and computing providers to cooperate on this large but socially extremely relevant task and to jointly make public information publicly accessible and usable again.”
Dr. Stefan Voigt is optimistic about a possible paradigm shift away from the current market concentration of large tech companies on the Internet.
The full interview is available on HomoDigital (in Polish) here.
In the episode with the enticing title “Will the European search engine come – how an independent search index is being created”, podcast host Martin Wolff spoke with our OSF board member Dr. Stefan Voigt as well as Prof. Dr. Michael Granitzer about the current search engine landscape.
With the vision to revolutionize web search on a European scale, the Open Search Foundation was one of the driving forces that kicked off the Open Web Search initiative in 2018.
Under this very initiative the eponymous OpenWebSearch.eu project was implemented in 2022 with 13 additional organizations from research and economy, all in all uniting forces across 7 European countries.
Now, only 2,5 years later, in 2025, the consortium proudly presents its common European federated Open Web Index pilot by the name of: OWI.
This achievement not only marks an important first cornerstone in European digital sovereignty, but it also comes at a critical time amidst urgent calls for action in the face of rapidly progressing global AI developments.
Innovators & early adopters wanted
From June onward, commercial and scientific development teams of any size as well as interested individuals are welcome to access and make use of almost a petabyte of open web data under a general research license or – upon request – under a designated commercial license as well.
This is an active call for early adopters to pioneer innovative projects surrounding vertical web search, argumentative search, LLM applications including RAG and more.
“The OWI symbolizes a first step towards true European digital sovereignty and is a fundamental step in paving the way for a comprehensive open European AI landscape.“
says OpenWebSearch.eu’s Community Manager Ursula Gmelch and she elaborates further:
“Our goal behind this initial pilot phase is to onboard a range of projects from diverse domains to get early feedback in. We look forward to users confirming the quality and value in current functionalities and/or helping us pivot in such ways that real market demands can be met and further expanded upon.“
Kick-off Event happens on 6 June
On 6 June from 10 am to 12 am CEST you can join the official kick-off event via Zoom.
Registration to the event is open under the following link:
https://cscfi.zoom.us/meeting/register/eATIpDQ5TZidh4Jzkim6FQ#/registration
“The Open Search Foundation from Starnberg coordinates a European initiative that aims to make the internet fairer and more transparent. It has now won a “Responsible Innovations” award” – such the headline of Starnberger Merkur
The anual Corporate Digital Responsibility Award by the German Association for the Digital Economy (BVDW) and Bayern Innovativ GmbH honors responsible digital projects. Tobias Gmach from Starnberger Merkur spoke to OSF board member Stefan Voigt about the award and current developments in the association’s Open Web Search initiative.
The article is available here (in German only): https://www.merkur.de/lokales/starnberg/starnberg-ort29487/sie-wollen-das-internet-gerechter-machen-preis-fuer-starnberger-netz-revolutionaere-93564190.html
“EU research power against Google’s dominance” German news broadcaster ZDF reports on OpenWebSearch.eu and the vision of open web search
“A European association is challenging Google: a public web index should finally ensure diversity on the search market. A Bavarian association plays a key role in this endeavour.” – In a current report, ZDF introduces the Open Search Foundation and the EU-funded OpenWebSearch.eu project, which was set up to build an independent, European search infrastructure. “Search engines decide what content is visible and how user, data and payment flows move,” states Dr. Stefan Voigt, CEO of the Open Search Foundation. “It is unacceptable for just one company to dominate this key infrastructure of the digital world.”
The article informs about the work of the Open Search Foundation and the beforementioned Horizon Europe project, which aims to build a free, community-driven search index that enables new, diverse search engine models – e.g. for science, journalism or regional content. The index could also serve as a data pool for AI models. The project is supported by 14 European partners from research and society, including the Leibniz Supercomputing Centre in Munich and CERN in Geneva. The EU funds the project with 8.5 million euros.
Open Search Foundation e.V.
The Open Search Foundation e.V. is a European movement of people and organisations that work together to create the foundation for independent, free and self-determined access to information on the Internet. In cooperation with research institutions, computer centres and other partners, we’re committed to a searching the web in a way that benefits everyone. The promotion of research in the field of search engines, plus education and cooperation, form the pillars of our work.
