The South Tyrol Museum of Archaeology became the primary public interface for the Ötzi phenomenon.

Austrian institutions, particularly the University of Innsbruck, maintained significant involvement in the research but were no longer the primary institutional custodians.

This arrangement — with primary custodianship in an Italian institution but with widespread international research collaboration — has generally worked well for the scientific study of the mummy.

The management of research access has been cautious: each request for samples or study access is carefully evaluated for scientific merit and for the potential for damage to the irreplaceable specimen.

The history of Ötzi research is partly a history of resource allocation — of deciding which analyses are worth the small amount of biological material they consume.