​CANTABRIA INTERNATIONAL CAMPUS INTERNACIONAL is a Project based on institutional and entrepreneurial cooperation, which aims to contribute in transforming the Autonomous Region of Cantabria into a region of knowledge.  With this objective, it designs strategies and heads action-lines which are aimed at achieving the international excellence of capabilities and academic resources, both scientific-technological and of transfer, in the autonomous region.

CCI is set within the Campus of International Excellence Programme (CEI), promoted in 2009 by the Spanish Government.  This programme aims to promote strategic aggregations between institutions which are capable of creating “knowledge eco-systems”.  These eco-systems are characterized by their capacity to favour employment, social coherence and economic development in the environment in which they are located.  The model has successful precedents in European territories which are similar to Cantabria, such as Lovaina, Aarhu, Grenoble, Galway or Lund.

CCI establishes four priority specialization areas according to its capacities (current and potential) to achieve the objectives in the project: Water and Energy, Biomedicine and Biotechnology, Finance and Entrepreneurial Activity and Heritage and Language.  These four areas are supported in another two complementary areas: Physics and Mathematics, and Technology.

Besides, the Project includes transversal action-lines aimed at improvement in three functional areas: Teaching Improvement and the European Higher Education Area, Scientific improvement and knowledge transfer; Transformation of the University Campus.

In the first official announcement of the programme, CCI was chosen by the Spanish Government as one of the top nine international campuses of Spanish universities. Being chosen has meant obtaining funding to carry out the proposed action-lines in the CCI Strategic Plan.