Asia is a key partner for the European Union, whether economically, politically or culturally and a region where the ICT sector has been developing very rapidly in the past years and is still offering very attractive perspectives. It was therefore essential that European organisations further develop scientific and technological cooperation with Asian organisations, namely in the ICT field.
It was also necessary that the cooperation efforts of European organisations could have been supported by activities, such as those implemented by the CHINACOOP project, aiming at facilitating the emergence of cooperation projects, accompany their development and strengthen their impact.

Launched in June 2005 for a period of over 3 years, the CHINACOOP project provided support services dedicated to European organisations, in continuity with the support actions that the IST Programme of the European Commission (DG Information Society and Media) has been developing for many years to strengthen EU-Asia cooperation.

More precisely, the CHINACOOP project has:

• provided DG Information Society and Media with operational support in assessing with the Chinese authorities the possibility to organise a joint exhibition in Beijing during the 2008 Olympic Games,

• organised two cooperation events in leading Asian cities (Tokyo and Seoul),

• developed and maintained a portal website (www.EuroAsia-ICT.org) and 3 country specific websites (www.EuroChina-ICT.org, www.EuroJapan-ICT.org, and www.EuroSouthKorea-ICT.org) in order to offer a comprehensive set of information and support services devoted to S&T cooperation between the EU and Asia in the ICT field.

CHINACOOP had a significant impact on the quality of the political cooperation framework between the EU and Asia (particularly with Japan and South Korea) in the ICT field, on the intensity of S&T cooperation activities between the regions, and on the image of European organisations and of the FP6 IST and FP7 ICT Programmes in Asia.