On June 10-11, 2026, the CustomAI Project Coordinator, Henrik Larsen, and the project’s communication and dissemination manager, Klaudia dos Santos, attended the Projects to Policy Seminar organized at the Renaissance Hotel in Brussels, Belgium.
Context
Every year, the European Research Executive Agency (REA) and the Directorate-General for Migration and Home Affairs (DG HOME) organize the Projects to Policy Seminar. This in-person, by-invitation-only event gathers the key representatives of the newly launched projects and it is structured into thematic breakout sessions, preceded by a plenary session with several presentations of general interest. The aim of the event is to raise awareness among the relevant policy Directorates-General on the newly launched projects and provide guidance to the new projects regarding policy-related outputs the Directorates-General are interested in.
The 2026 edition
The seminar was opened with a welcome and presentation of the agenda in Ballrooms 1 & 2, setting the stage for a productive two days of networking, knowledge exchange, and synergy creation between projects and EU policy.
During the first day, the participants met in groups split into four thematic areas for more targeted and insightful discussions:
- Fighting Crime & Terrorism (13 projects)
- Resilient Infrastructure (4 projects)
- Disaster Resilient Societies (11 projects)
- Border Management (8 projects)
As an innovative initiative focused on border security, CustomAI was part of the Border Management (BM) group, meeting in room Lisbon.
The event featured various informative sessions and panel discussions, covering several topics, including but not limited to:
- Policy Roundtables
- Dissemination, Communication & Exploitation in Security Research and feedback to policy
- Innovation & Research Activities of EU Agencies and of the Joint Research Centre
- Exploitation of projects and innovation uptake
Day two shifted focus toward cross-thematic collaboration, with breakout sessions across thematic areas. CustomAI joined Group 2 in room Madrid , engaging in cross-cutting discussions alongside projects like MARCONNECT, DEFENSEFOOD, GUARDIANS, BTL-COP, CapCell, CRYPTOACTION, RESCUE, and PALAESTRA.
During the seminar, the participants had a chance to present their projects. Representing CustomAI, Project Coordinator Henrik Legind Larsen introduced the project’s mission to leverage AI to drastically enhance European customs operations. The presentation highlighted a major bottleneck in global trade: while trade volumes grow, manual inspections cannot scale, leading to low hit-rates where only about 1% of inspected containers actually yield contraband. CustomAI revealed how its ecosystem—centered around a digital ‘brain’ called the Virtual Customs Control Office (VCCO)—combines AI data triage, non-intrusive vapor and X-ray sensing, and secure blockchain technology to boost that success rate to over 10% while speeding up legitimate trade.
The presentation generated significant interest among the participants, leading to several follow-up discussions during the networking coffee breaks.
In addition to the main stage presentation, attendees in the networking area could watch the project’s animated explainer video. Acting as the quickest introduction to what CustomAI is all about, the video allowed viewers to discover—in less than two minutes—the mission of this European Union-funded project. It visually demonstrated how CustomAI brings together a multidisciplinary consortium of experts to develop an AI-driven toolkit designed to enhance the accuracy and efficiency of customs operations.
The seminar was a great success. It concluded with a session in Ballrooms 1 & 2 where DG HOME area coordinators shared the key take-aways from the breakout sessions, fostering a very direct and honest contact between the project consortia and the European Commission.
The key takeaways from the discussions held during the event include a strong consensus on the need to include practitioners and end-users at all stages of development, ensuring the technology aligns with day-to-day operational realities. Furthermore, participants emphasized focusing on exploitation early on in the project lifecycle to guarantee that solutions can be smoothly adopted by the market and policy frameworks later on. The discussions also highlighted the vital importance of developing trustworthy, explainable AI systems that keep humans in the loop, alongside creating interoperable architectures that can securely bridge data sharing across different national customs authorities.
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