AXENCIA GALEGA PARA A XESTION DO CONECEMENTO EN SAUDE

Their core work

ACIS — the Galician Agency for Health Knowledge Management — is a regional public authority in Galicia, Spain, responsible for managing health innovation, knowledge transfer, and procurement within the Galician public health system. In H2020, they coordinated a Pre-Commercial Procurement (PCP) initiative to develop better digital communication tools between patients with chronic diseases and their care providers, and later joined a coordination network to align EU regional structural funds with the uptake of personalised medicine. Their core value lies in connecting regional health governance with EU innovation instruments: they know how to run public procurement processes for unproven health technologies and how to mobilise structural funds for health system transformation. For consortium builders, they bring institutional authority, procurement competence, and direct links to regional health policy levers — not lab-based research.

What they specialise in

How they've shifted over time

In their first project (EMPATTICS, starting 2016), ACIS focused on the operational challenge of patient empowerment: running a PCP process to procure digital tools that improve communication and treatment adherence in chronic disease. By 2018, with REGIONS4PERMED, their attention shifted upstream — from procurement of specific solutions toward the policy infrastructure needed to scale personalised medicine across EU regions, working with structural funds and smart specialisation frameworks. The trajectory is clear: from health procurement practitioner toward regional health policy architect, with a growing interest in how EU funding instruments can be aligned to drive health system transformation at scale.

ACIS is moving from hands-on health procurement toward strategic coordination of EU regional investments in personalised medicine — positioning itself as a policy-level actor rather than a technology buyer.

How they like to work

ACIS has taken both a leadership role (coordinating the larger EMPATTICS project) and a supporting participant role (in REGIONS4PERMED), showing flexibility depending on the initiative. With 15 unique partners across 9 countries from just 2 projects, they work in comparatively large, geographically diverse consortia. As a public regional agency, they tend to anchor consortia with institutional legitimacy and access to procurement authority or structural funds rather than providing technical research output.

ACIS has built a notably broad network for its project count: 15 unique partners across 9 countries from only 2 projects, averaging 7-8 countries per consortium. This reflects their involvement in coordination-type projects that deliberately bring together multiple European regions.

What sets them apart

Among regional public health bodies in H2020, ACIS stands out for having coordinated a full Pre-Commercial Procurement project — a demanding and specialised funding instrument that most public authorities never attempt. This gives them direct, hands-on experience in running competitive procurement for unproven health technologies, which is a rare capability. For any consortium needing a public-sector partner who can anchor a PCP process, drive regional structural fund involvement, or represent Galicia/Northwest Spain in interregional health cooperation, ACIS is a highly specific and practical fit.

Highlights from their portfolio

• EMPATTICS
  Largest project (EUR 2.3M) and coordinator role: a full Pre-Commercial Procurement process targeting better patient-provider communication tools for chronic disease — rare for a regional health agency to lead.
• REGIONS4PERMED
  Long-running coordination action (2018-2023) linking smart specialisation strategies and EU structural funds to accelerate personalised medicine uptake across European regions.