THHINK BV

Their core work

THHINK BV is a Dutch innovation brokering firm based in Leiden that specialises in helping SMEs navigate and adopt digital technologies, operating primarily as an intermediary within the EU's Smart Anything Everywhere (SAE) ecosystem. Their practical work involves running technology radars, maintaining innovation portals, and connecting companies with relevant digital solutions across IoT, cyber-physical systems, and embedded intelligence — translating complex technology landscapes into concrete digitisation pathways for companies without internal R&D capacity. In their more recent work they have shifted toward building the infrastructure around Digital Innovation Hubs (DIHs), including investor linkage, training, and connecting regional innovation initiatives across Europe. They are not technology developers; they are the people who make sure the right companies find the right technology at the right moment.

What they specialise in

How they've shifted over time

In their first project (Smart4Europe, 2017–2019), THHINK's work was grounded in specific technology domains — cyber-physical systems, IoT, organic and large area electronics, and low energy computing — suggesting they operated close to actual technology content, helping SMEs understand and adopt these specific fields. By their second project (Smart4Europe2, 2020–2021), those technology-specific keywords disappeared entirely, replaced by ecosystem-level concepts: DIH ecosystem, training, investor linkage, and linking initiatives across regions. This is a clear trajectory from technology-facing brokering toward institutional and ecosystem orchestration — THHINK is moving up the value chain from matching companies to technologies toward building the infrastructure that makes that matching possible at scale.

THHINK is evolving from hands-on technology matchmaking into broader innovation infrastructure — connecting DIHs, investors, and regional initiatives — which positions them as a platform-layer actor rather than a pure technology broker.

How they like to work

THHINK has never led an H2020 project — both participations were as consortium partner within SAE initiative networks coordinated by others, which is typical of specialised intermediaries who bring a defined service rather than overall project management. Their consortium is small and consistent (7 partners across 4 countries over two projects), suggesting they work within tight, purposeful networks rather than broad open calls. This makes them predictable and low-friction as a partner — they know their role, they stay in their lane, and they deliver the brokering and portal work that larger coordinators rely on them for.

THHINK has worked with 7 unique partners across 4 countries, with both projects drawing from the same SAE initiative network — their European reach is real but narrow, concentrated within the digital innovation and DIH community. There is no evidence of partnerships outside that ecosystem, which reflects a focused rather than opportunistic collaboration strategy.

What sets them apart

THHINK occupies a specific and hard-to-replicate niche: they understand both the EU policy language of SAE and DIH initiatives and the practical digitisation challenges of SMEs, which makes them valuable as translators in consortia that need someone to face industry while the researchers face the science. Both of their projects are CSA (Coordination and Support Actions) — meaning their entire H2020 track record is in facilitation and ecosystem building, not research, which is unusual and signals genuine expertise in the coordination function rather than borrowed credibility from R&D work. For a consortium that needs a proven SME-facing intermediary with portal, radar, and brokering tools already built, THHINK is a ready-made component.

Highlights from their portfolio

• Smart4Europe
  The founding project that established THHINK's role in the SAE ecosystem, covering the broadest technology scope — IoT, CPS, OLAE, low energy computing — and the highest EC contribution of the two projects (EUR 114,219).
• Smart4Europe2
  The direct continuation project, notable for the deliberate pivot toward DIH ecosystem development, investor linkage, and training, revealing how THHINK consciously repositioned from technology brokering toward innovation infrastructure.