On February 9 the NEWCOMERS consortium was invited for its first virtual review meeting where the achievements and overall progress of the first 18 months of the project were evaluated and discussed with project officer Manuela Conconi from INEA. 

In preparation of the meeting, all NEWCOMERS consortium partners reflected on the work carried out so far and revisited the goals and objectives set in the beginning of the project. Plans for adjustments and to increase the project’s impact in the following year and a half were made.

During the meeting, work package leaders presented their work, current deliverables, and research results to date, as well as any deviations and additional achievements. Future plans for each work package, as well as exploitation and dissemination possibilities were also presented and discussed. Another point on the agenda was the influence of the Covid-19 pandemic on the project. Although this required some adjustments in the research, we concluded that the consortium managed to cope with the challenges it brought relatively well.

The meeting finished with an overall discussion and a feedback from the project officer, who was overall very satisfied with the progress and sees ample possibilities for further development and exploitation of the projects outputs. Given the very positive feedback, the consortium partners of the NEWCOMERS project are excited to start the second half of the project.