STICHTING BO-EX 91

Their core work

BO-EX 91 is a Dutch social housing corporation based in Utrecht that brings the perspective of a real estate owner and residential community manager to EU research projects. Their practical contribution lies in providing real urban neighbourhoods as living laboratories — actual housing stock, tenants, and local governance structures where sustainable energy and circular economy solutions can be deployed and tested at scale. They bridge the gap between technology developers and end-users by managing citizen engagement, co-creation processes, and the operational realities of retrofitting and upgrading residential buildings. In EU projects, they represent the "demand side" of urban sustainability transitions: the organisations that own, operate, and are accountable for the places where people live.

What they specialise in

How they've shifted over time

In their first H2020 project (IRIS, from 2017), BO-EX focused on the technology integration layer of sustainable cities — deploying smart solutions, renewable energy, energy storage, and electric mobility within a city innovation platform, with co-creation as the engagement method. By their second project (ARV, from 2022), the framing had shifted decisively from "smart city tech" to "climate-positive circular communities" — emphasising whole-neighbourhood systemic change, indoor environmental quality, green digital financing, and the policy and regulatory environment that makes or blocks such change. The trend is clear: from deploying specific technologies to transforming entire residential ecosystems, and from citizen engagement as a tool to circular economy as a design principle.

BO-EX is moving from technology pilot host toward a systemic actor in climate-positive housing, increasingly engaged with financing mechanisms and policy frameworks — making them a strong partner for projects that need a credible, large-scale residential deployment site in the Netherlands.

How they like to work

BO-EX participates exclusively as a consortium partner and has never led an H2020 project, which is consistent with their identity as an implementation and end-user organisation rather than a research or technology developer. Despite only two projects, they have accumulated 91 unique consortium partners — an unusually high number that reflects participation in large, multi-city Innovation Actions with broad consortia. This suggests they are comfortable operating within complex, multi-partner environments and contribute a distinct, non-duplicable asset: access to real housing stock and established tenant relationships.

BO-EX has connected with 91 unique partners across 14 countries through just two projects, indicating participation in large-scale European Innovation Actions with wide geographic spread. Their network likely spans technology developers, municipalities, universities, and other housing associations across Northern and Western Europe.

What sets them apart

BO-EX offers something most research and technology partners cannot: a real operational housing portfolio in a Dutch city, with existing tenant relationships and the institutional authority to implement building-level changes across hundreds of dwellings. For any project that needs to move beyond lab conditions and demonstrate solutions in lived residential environments, a social housing corporation is an irreplaceable partner. Their combination of co-creation experience, circular economy orientation, and growing engagement with green financing makes them particularly valuable for projects targeting the hard-to-decarbonise residential sector.

Highlights from their portfolio

• IRIS
  A large-scale Innovation Action (EUR 1.2M to BO-EX alone) running 2017-2023 that used Utrecht as one of its lighthouse cities, integrating renewable energy, storage, electric mobility, and citizen co-creation within a replicable smart city platform.
• ARV
  An ongoing project (2022-2026) pushing the frontier further into climate-positive circular communities and zero-emission neighbourhoods, with new dimensions of green digital financing and indoor environmental quality.