The MICHAEL project is a multi-national deployment of a cultural portal platform already in use in France. It focuses on the integration and alignment of many national initiatives in the digital cultural heritage sector, including the most important initiatives in France, Italy and the UK. The project will deliver interoperability of national cultural portal initiatives and a high-quality end-user service, which will facilitate the exploitation of European cultural content resources. The key objectives of the MICHAEL project are to add value to the European cultural heritage and to encourage interoperability and the use of common standards across major national digital cultural heritage initiatives.