HelioHelix was seeded as part of the post-project sustainability plan for the EU Excellence Hubs (EH) project “SolarHub: A Greek-Turkish Solar Energy Excellence Hub to Advance the European Green Deal”. The name HelioHelix was strategically chosen for the following reasons:
Helio comes from the Greek sun god Helios and reflects HelioHelix’s core thematic and geographic scope as follows:
Core Thematic Scope: Solar energy;
Core Geographic Scope: Modern day Greece and Türkiye as Helios’ historical home.
Helix, which is also of Greek origin, indicates that HelioHelix’s innovation model is based on collaboration among two or more complementary key stakeholders (i.e., strands) leading to “Co-Creation Helices”, including in particular,
Triple (3H), Quadruple (4H) and Quintuple (5H) co-creation helices based on collaborations with representation from academia, businesses, and public authorities (3H), and society (4H), and environment (5H).
Co-creation helices based on solar-inclusive interthematic collaborations (e.g., solar-food-water) and Greek and/or Turkish inclusive geographic collaborations (e.g., Greek and Turkish solar energy collaborations with other Balkan, Widening, European, Mediterranean, and/or MENA countries).
Complex multi-strand co-creation helices including both interthematic and geographically diverse collaborations targeting holistic and robust solutions to societal challenges with large potentials for replication.
HelioHelix Webpage Positioning: This is a 1st generation webpage launched in Jan. 2026 with a 2nd generation webpage targeted for late 2026. The planned webpage advancements reflect the broader advancement of HelioHelix from a 1st generation to a 2nd generation self-sustaining European EH. The positioning of the 1st generation webpage and HelioHelix as a self-sustaining European EH are as follows:
Target Audiences:
Primary: Current and potential HelioHelix members;
Secondary: European Commission (EC);
Tertiary: Other key external stakeholders.
Objectives:
Primary: To seed and frame discussions among the current and potential members to advance a shared vision for collaboration that is reflected in the 2nd generation webpage and EH;
Secondary: To communicate these activities to the EC;
Tertiary: To communicate these activities to other key external stakeholders.
Strategy: To focus on developing and piloting non-binding ideas in a low-cost and agile manner, and refine these into more stable ideas that feed the 2nd generation webpage and EH.
The 2nd generation webpage targeted to be completed in late 2026 will be more
Extroverted: More strongly target the EC and other key external stakeholders;
Stable: More of the core content will consist of successfully piloted, and therefore stable, ideas;
Polished: The advancement toward a more extroverted and stable webpage will be reflected in having more resources invested to have a polished and professional presentation.
HelioHelix Positioning:
HelioHelix Vision: For HelioHelix to be a financially self-sustaining European EH contributing to holistic solutions to complex societal solutions.
HelioHelix Mission: To be an enabling framework that contributes to
A shared vision, aligned strategies, and interconnected activities that synergistically advances the interests of the HelioHelix members;
A compelling story to make Europe more sustainable, secure, and prosperous that the HelioHelix members can use to engage and influence a diverse and comprehensive set of key stakeholders, especially key decision makers.
HelioHelix Strategy: To be an agile and financially self-sustaining Dissemination, Exploitation, and Communication (DEC) platform that synergistically supports, extends, and multiplies the HelioHelix members’ DEC activities in a cost-effective manner.
HelioHelix has both Core Helio and Expanded Helix Aims:
HelioHelix DEC Assets: The 1st generation HelioHelix DEC platform consists of
HelioHelix Brand;
Webpage: To reduce administrative costs and increase agility, the HelioHelix webpage is being incubated as part of the Widening Impacts website, where the regularly updated Widening Impacts home page is used for all HelioHelix announcements while the HelioHelix webpage contains more persistent content, and therefore is updated less frequently;
LinkedIn Account;
Open Google Group email list used to announce HelioHelix activities and outcomes;
Networks and structures to support inter-institutional collaborations.
HelioHelix Members: To increase agility and reduce administrative burden, only high-level summary information is presented herein for HelioHelix members while links are provided to other webpages with supporting member details.
HelioHelix Governance: The 1st generation HelioHelix platform is governed by SolarHub’s Steering Committee. The governance model for the 2nd generation HelioHelix platform will be defined to synergistically advance the interests of the HelioHelix members making the largest contributions to HelioHelix.
IP Management: HelioHelix’s spirit-of-intent is to allow all HelioHelix members to use the HelioHelix platform to advance their interests based on the following conditions: 1) the use is aligned with and supports HelioHelix’s interests; 2) the use does not create unwanted work for others (e.g., administrative work to maintain the web page). More rigorously, the process to develop the HelioHelix platform over the spring 2026 will be used to better identify and characterize HelioHelix’s key assets. The transition from the 1st to the 2nd generation platform will be used to develop and implement robust methods to manage HelioHelix’s IP.
Financing and Sustainability Model: The 1st generation HelioHelix platform is being incubated using SolarHub project resources and ODTÜ-GÜNAM and METU in-kind contributions. One of the aims for the 1st generation HelioHelix platform is to develop a financial model that allows HelioHelix activities to be sustained after the SolarHub project ends on 31 Dec. 2026.
Connect and Follow:
Join HelioHelix Google Group to receive email announcements (at most 1 email per week).
Contact:
Derek Baker, HelioHelix Coordinator, SolarHub Project Coordinator: dbaker@metu.edu.tr