South Denmark European Office (SDEO) was established in 2007 as a non for-profit public partnership institution, and is a co-operation between the Region of South Denmark and the 22 municipalities in the region. SDEO is an innovation office with employees placed in Brussels, to be close to the European Commission and relevant European associations, as well as in the Region.

SDEO’s main objective is to create local and regional networks/partnerships and broad regional cooperation in order to develop and implement EU-projects, benefitting the citizens, the enterprises and other local and / or regional actors, within areas such as Clean Energy & Climate, Health & Welfare Innovation, Competence Development & Qualified Labour, Design & Culture as well as Enterprise partnerships and innovation.

The executive board of SDEO consists of members from the regional council, the regional growth forum, and mayors from the municipalities. Hence, through common strategies, yearly workplans and regular board meetings, the strategic and political level within both the region and the municipalities are involved and engaged in the activities of SDEO. This co-operation gives SDEO easy access and good capacity to influence regional and local strategy and policy development, through the presentation of good practice results from European projects.