EXPAND II intends to support the implementation of the JPI Urban Europe Strategic Research and Innovation Agenda 2.0 (SRIA 2.0) and advance the R&I programme by (1) supporting JPI Urban Europe’s widening activities towards new countries, stakeholders and partners, (2) facilitating the transition from SRIA 2015 to SRIA 2.0 in terms of enhancing formats, instruments, strategic partnerships, and programme management, and by (3) improving availability and accessibility of research results for cities, funders, policy and decision makers. Since transformations to sustainable and liveable urban futures depend on a broad commitment and co-creation among a diverse set of actors, the identified challenge to be tackled by EXPAND II is widening the community and building capacities in research, policy and society at large. In this sense, the project targets Widening Countries in particular with the aim to establish national dialogues and processes, mobilise national R&I communities dealing with sustainable urban development, intensify strategic relationships of urban stakeholders on transnational level and assess national programmes and instruments for transnational R&I cooperation. The transition arena concept is used as the basic concept for widening participation and capacity building. As the center piece of the transition arena the concept of the JPI Urban Europe Stakeholder Involvement Platform (AGORA) will be applied and advanced. Furthermore, the challenge is tackled by professionalising programme management in JPI Urban Europe in order to make research results more easily accessible for policy and decision makers, provide data and cases to easily follow the progress achieved in JPI Urban Europe and its projects and strengthen the programme as a hub for international cooperation. All these activities are tuned to further expand the programme towards Widening Countries and other interested parties, offer information and platforms to engage for researchers, urban pu