Ongaro, PaoloMinelli, Sam HabibiDuranti, DanielePoli, NaomiRossi, MartinaUgoletti, DanieleSaccoccio, RubinoRaggioli, AlbertoCampana, StefanoFerdani, DanieleGraf, HolgerGuidi, GabrieleHegarty, ZackaryPescarin, SofiaRemondino, Fabio2025-09-052025-09-052025978-3-03868-277-6https://doi.org/10.2312/dh.20253302https://diglib.eg.org/handle/10.2312/dh20253302This paper introduces the Collection Ingestion Tool (CIT), a modular and standards-compliant component within the ECHOES European Collaborative Cloud for Cultural Heritage (ECCCH). Designed to support scalable, interoperable, and semantically enriched cataloguing, the CIT addresses the pressing needs of cultural institutions-particularly small and medium-sized ones-facing technological, organizational, and multilingual barriers in metadata management. The CIT empowers curators, researchers, and archivists to ingest, annotate, and publish cultural datasets with enhanced discoverability and interoperability integrating advanced tools for NLP and AI-powered metadata enrichment, support for Heritage Digital Representations (HDRs) (e.g. 2D/3D and associated data, metadata and paradata) asset management, and alignment with heritage metadata standards. Built atop the ECHOES infrastructure, the tool benefits from shared services such as identity management, storage, and a federated Knowledge Base compatible with Heritage Digital Representations (HDRs) principles. Through a practical workflow scenario and alignment with FAIR and LOD principles, the paper demonstrates how the CIT enables cross-domain reuse, multilingual access, and enriched user experiences while fostering sustainability and community integration across Europe's heritage sector.Attribution 4.0 International License10.2312/dh.202533024 pages