Twenty European cities including London, Barcelona and Helsinki have got behind a new network for sharing information in mobile and IT.

Dubbed “Living Labs Europe”, the project is designed to allow private companies, research institutes and investors collaborate on joint projects and share technical information on testing and development of next-generation technologies and mobile services.

Living Labs Europe includes the Spanish cities of Barcelona, Mataro and Sant Cugat and the Catalonia region. Budapest, Istanbul, London, Salzburg, Sophia-Antipolis in France, Stuttgart, Tallinn, Torino, Copenhagen, Helsinki, Oslo, the Swedish-Danish region of Oeresund, and the four Swedish cities of Lund, Malmoe, Vaestervik and Stockholm are also included.

“New, concrete measures are needed to… make Europe more competitive and innovative in a human-centric way, a way that focuses on peoples’ real needs,” Finnish Prime Minister Matti Vanhanen said. The network was launched in Helsinki. Finland currently holds the EU presidency

“One of the goals of the network is to attract companies from around the world to take part in European research and innovation efforts,” Vanhanen added.