The Finnish Virtual University

Abstract The building up of the Finnish Virtual University is based on the work to build an Information Society. All (21) Finnish universities decided to put their efforts together and to build a consortium the carry out the challenging task both technically, organizationally and financially. The work for the virtual university is at the same time strategic discussion among the partner universities and within the project organization as well as operational project work to define, design and implement services needed. The original Virtual University has been defined in terms of service portfolio designed using certain technical solutions. These are seen as very evolutionary solutions and when completed in 2004 the solutions will look slightly different from what they are today. The project has taken the quality issues (both of the processes and of the service products) seriously. First steps have been taken but the will be a long way to go, before the best practice has been achieved.