The construction of the Alliance was launched in January 2018 thanks to the work and dialogue undertaken within the Conférence Régionale des Présidents d’Université (CRPU), a consultation body that the presidents of the five public universities in the Region wished to reactivate. This approach was initiated, on the one hand, by the observation that the new regional borders imposed a repositioning of partnership strategies on a territorial scale and, on the other hand, by the desire to go beyond the limits of the existing grouping models at the time, those of the former Comue LNF and the Association Picardie Universités.

This dialogue led on 9 June 2018 to the signing of a framework cooperation agreement between the three institutions. The Alliance initiated aims, on the one hand, to preserve the institutions’ own identities and missions and, on the other hand, to position them strategically in a complex regional ecosystem. The political choice of cooperation in “project” mode has already resulted in several emblematic successes, such as the award of the PIA3 NCU “Licence Compétences en Réseau” in 2018 and two other PIA3 TIPs in 2020, one as part of the “Dispositifs territoriaux pour l’orientation vers les études supérieures” (territorial devices for guidance towards higher education) with the “OSER!

The strengths of the site are to be reinforced and developed to maintain the scientific and economic vitality of the Region. In this respect, the Alliance will have to define the strategy of shared projects at the operational level, particularly in the fields of competence requiring a common strategy, notably for research, training, development and international relations. Similarly, the site will promote a joint response to regional, national and international calls for projects.