## 1 Introduction  
Modern societies increasingly rely on information and communications technologies and infrastructures in their economies, the provision of public services, and social interaction. While access to abundant information and digital infrastructures provide various advantages, they introduce vulnerabilities that are readily exploited by malicious actors in the pursuit of financial gain, i.e., through cybercrime, or political objectives by gathering intelligence, retaliation against an attack, disrupting essential services during conflict, interfering in elections, and other forms of cyber warfare and cyber terrorism [1]. Accordingly, information and cyber security incidents have evolved from isolated attacks to targeted, sophisticated cyber threats at individual, organisational and even national levels [2]. Notwithstanding the risks of malicious exploitation, advanced sensors, actuators, computational technologies, increased data storage, communications, achievements in artificial intelligence, etc., will be progressively incorporated in industrial processes, transport vehicles and networks, health services, critical infrastructures and homes. The provision of safety, security and privacy in utilising the benefits of technology will remain a persistent challenge in the foreseeable future [3]. Very few organisations have the resources and the competencies required to protect their communications, information systems, and smart devices from attacks through cyberspace. A recent study on organising national cybersecurity concluded that one of the main choices is whether to centralise cyber capacity in one unit or spread it across different sectors [4]. Government agencies of countries like Belgium and Bulgaria recognise in their strategies that, as cyber threats become more complex, there is a growing need to expand horizontal coordination [5] and engage with multiple stakeholders, including those from industry and academia [6]. In fact, only a few countries have the resources to develop and deploy autonomously technological and organisational solutions to counter effectively the threats from cyberspace. The European Union as a whole looks for creating a reliable, safe, and open cyber ecosystem through enhanced networking and collaboration between Member States and EU agencies, public and private actors, academic organisations and industry. The European Parliament and the Council issued in 2018 a proposal for a Regulation on establishing a European cybersecurity industrial, technology and research competence centre and a network of national coordination centres [7]. A call for proposals within Horizon 2020 was issued in parallel with the goal to overcome the fragmentation of EU research capacities and ensure that \"the EU retains and develops essential capacities to secure its digital economy, infrastructures, society, and democracy\" [8]. More specifically, the call aimed to establish and operate a pilot for a \"Cybersecurity Competence Network,\" and four such pilots, selected in a competitive procedure, were launched in 2019. By establishing a collaborative network, participating organisations expect to get access to competencies and/or resources complementing their own and thus to access new markets and meet emerging demands from public authorities and industry while sharing risks with partners. The advantages of collaborative arrangements in manufacturing have been exploited for at least two decades and since mid-2010s became subject of rigorous study [9]. This trend is relatively new for the field of cybersecurity. Nevertheless, it has already attracted considerable attention. Expectedly for such high-technology field, researchers already explore the benefits of advanced technological solutions such as blockchain [10; 11] and translation gateways [12] to support collaborative processes.