The kick-off meeting of the BDVe project took place in January 24-25th at SAP premises, in Paris. The partners had the opportunity to meet, discuss and exchange their views on the different aspects of the project. Work package leaders exposed their respective development activities, the objectives and the expected impact. Kimmo Rossi and Carola Carsten, from the European Commission, and John Domingue, from European Data Science Academy (EDSA), were invited to the meeting.