CENTRE EUROPEEN D'ETUDES DE SECURITE ET D'ANALYSE DES RISQUES

Their core work

CEESAR (Centre Européen d'Études de Sécurité et d'Analyse des Risques) is a small French research centre dedicated to transport safety and risk analysis. Their core work involves studying why accidents happen — identifying causal chains, quantifying the safety benefits of countermeasures, and evaluating risks introduced by new mobility technologies. They have contributed to EU research on both traditional road safety (accident causation, safety measure effectiveness) and the safety implications of autonomous vehicles operating in urban environments. As a specialist SME, they bring independent analytical capacity rather than engineering or manufacturing capability, making them a methodological partner for safety assessment within large research consortia.

What they specialise in

How they've shifted over time

In their earliest H2020 work (SafetyCube, 2015-2018), CEESAR focused on the fundamentals of road safety: understanding why accidents happen, measuring the effectiveness of safety interventions, and building evidence bases for policy. By 2018, their focus shifted clearly toward the safety challenges of autonomous and disruptive mobility systems — a much more prospective, technology-facing form of risk analysis. This trajectory suggests CEESAR has repositioned from retrospective accident analysis toward forward-looking safety evaluation of technologies that do not yet have established risk profiles.

CEESAR is moving from analysing past accidents toward assessing the safety and risk implications of autonomous and shared mobility systems — a direction aligned with where EU transport policy and investment are heading through 2030.

How they like to work

CEESAR participates exclusively as a consortium partner — they have not coordinated any H2020 project — which signals a preference for contributing focused expertise within larger research teams rather than managing projects. Despite only two projects, they have engaged with 39 unique partners across 15 countries, meaning both were large, multi-stakeholder European consortia. This pattern suggests they are sought out as a specialist safety/risk analysis node, brought into projects where independent analytical credibility on safety matters is needed.

CEESAR has built a surprisingly wide network — 39 unique partners across 15 countries — through participation in just two large European research projects. Their connections span the major EU transport research ecosystem, likely including vehicle manufacturers, universities, public authorities, and technology providers active in the road safety and autonomous mobility space.

What sets them apart

CEESAR's value proposition is independence and specialisation: they are a dedicated risk and safety analysis centre, not a university lab with broad interests or an engineering firm with a consulting arm. Their institutional name — European Centre for Security Studies and Risk Analysis — signals a methodological identity centred on causation and evidence, not engineering solutions. For consortium builders in transport, they offer credible, independent safety assessment without conflicts of interest tied to vehicle or technology development.

Highlights from their portfolio

• AVENUE
  Their largest project by far (€649,250 EC funding), focused on deploying autonomous vehicles in real urban environments — CEESAR's highest-profile and most forward-looking engagement to date.
• SafetyCube
  A foundational EU road safety project building a scientific evidence base for accident causation and countermeasure effectiveness, establishing CEESAR's credentials in systematic safety analysis.