espacios de datos

Building the European Health Data Space is one of the challenges of our generation. The COVID 19 pandemic put us in front of the mirror and brought back at least two images. The first was none other than the result of the application of formalistic, bureaucratised and old-fashioned models of data management. Second, the enormous potential offered by data sharing, collaboration of interdisciplinary teams and the use of health information for the common good. The European Union is clearly committed to the second strategy. This article examines the challenges of building a National Health Data Space as an instrument to enhance the reuse of health data for secondary uses from a variety of perspectives.

The error of focusing on formalist visions

The data processing and sharing scenario prior to the deployment of the European data strategy and its commitment to data spaces produced not only counter-intuitive, but also counter-factual effects. The framework of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) instead of favouring processing operated as a barrier.  Strict enforcement was chosen, based on the prevalence of privacy. Instead of seeking to manage risk through legal and technical solutions, the decision was made not to process data or to use technically complex anonymisations that are unfeasible in practice.

This model is not sustainable. Technological acceleration forces a shift in the centre of gravity from prohibition to risk management and data governance. And this is what Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council on the European Health Data Space (EHDS) is committed to: finding solutions and defining guarantees to protect people. And this transformation finds Spain's healthcare sector in an unbeatable situation from any point of view, although it is not without risks.

Spain, a pioneer in the change of approach

Our country did its homework with the seventeenth additional provision on the processing of health data in Organic Law 3/2018, of 5 December, on the Protection of Personal Data and Guarantee of Digital Rights (LOPDGDD, in Spanish acronyms). The regulation circumvented most of the problems affecting the secondary use of health data and did so with the methodology derived from the GDPR and the jurisprudence of the Constitutional Court. To this end, he opted for:

• A clear systematisation and normative predetermination of use cases.
• A precise definition of treatment entitlements.
• Procedural, contractual and security guarantees.

The Provision was five years ahead of the EHDS in terms of its aims, objectives and safeguards. Not only that, it puts our healthcare system at a competitive advantage from a legal and material point of view.

From this point of view, the National Health Data Space as the backbone is a project that is as essential as it is unpostponable, as reflected in the National Health System's Digital Health strategy and the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan. However, this assertion cannot be based on uncritical enthusiasm. Much work remains to be done.

Lessons learned and challenges to overcome

European research projects managed by the ecosystem of health foundations at the Carlos Tercero Institute, university and business, provide interesting lessons. In our country we are working on precision medicine, on the construction of data lakes, on mobile applications, on high capacities of pseudonymisation and anonymisation, on medical imaging, on predictive artificial intelligence..., and we could go on. This ecosystem needs a layer of governance innovation. Part of it will be provided directly by the EHDS. Data access bodies, the supervisory authority and cross-border access structures shall ensure the lifecycle from the formation of catalogued and reliable datasets to their actual processing. These governance infrastructures require an organisational and human deployment to support them. Previous experience helps to anticipate the risks that a stress test may pose for the whole value chain:

1. The training of human resources in crucial aspects of data protection, information security and new ethical requirements is not always adequate in terms of format, volume and profile segmentation. Not 100% of the workforce is trained, while voluntary continuing education for health professionals is of a high legal standard, causing an effect that is as counterproductive as it is perverse: curtailing the capacity to innovate. If instead of empowering and engaging, we offer an endless list of GDPR obligations, research staff end up self-censoring their ability to imagine. The content and the training target are confused. High-level training should focus on project managers and technical and legal support staff. And in these, data protection officer plays a vehicular role, as it is the person who must provide non-binary advice - of the legal or non-legal type - and cannot transfer all the responsibility to the research team.
2. Governance of treatment resources and processes needs to be improved. In certain research areas, and universities are the best example of this, information systems are segmented and managed at the smallest project or research team level. These are insufficient resources, with little control over risk management and security monitoring, including support for the management and maintenance of the treatment environment. Moreover, data access procedures are based on rigid models, anchored in the case study or clinical trial. Thus, more often than not, we handle datasets in very specific environments outside the main data processing centres. This multiplies the risk, and the costs, in areas such as data protection impact assessments or the deployment of security measures.

Lack of expertise can pose systemic risks. To begin with, Ethics Committees are confronted with issues of data protection and artificial intelligence ethics that overwhelm their habits, customs and knowledge, and mothball their processes. On the other hand, what we commonly refer to as big data is not something that happens by magic. Pseudonymisation or anonymisation, annotation, enrichment and validation of the dataset and the processes implemented on it require highly skilled professionals. 

Effects of EHDS

We should reflect on whether our leading position in digitisation could also be our Achilles' heel. Few countries have a high degree of digitisation of every level of healthcare, from primary to hospital. Virtually none have regulated the use of pseudonymised data without consent, nor the broad consent model of our LOPDGDD. In this sense, under the umbrella of the EHDS there could be two effects that we need to manage:

• New opportunities in research projects. Firstly, as soon as Spanish health institutions publish their data catalogues at European level, requests for access from other countries could multiply. And, therefore, the opportunities to participate in research projects as information providers, data holders, or as data users.
• Boosting the ecosystem of innovative companies. Moreover, the wide range of secondary uses foreseen by the EHDS will broaden the profile of actors submitting data access requests. This points to the possibility of a unique ecosystem of innovative companies for the deployment of health solutions from wellness to artificial intelligence-assisted medical diagnostics. 

This forces those responsible for the public health system to ask themselves a rather simple question: what level of availability, process capability, security and interoperability can the available information systems offer? Let us not forget that many trans-European research projects, or the deployment of Artificial Intelligence tools in the health sector, are backed by budgets running into millions.  This presents enormous opportunities to deepen the deployment of new models of health service delivery that also feed back into research, innovation and entrepreneurship. But there is also the risk of not being able to take advantage of the available resources due to shortcomings in the design of repositories and their processing capabilities.

What data space model are we pursuing?

The answer to this question can be found very clearly both in the European Union's data space strategy and in the Spanish Government's own strategy. The task that the EHDS attributes to data access bodies, beyond the mere granting of an access permit, is to support and assist in the development of the processing. This requires a National Health Data Space to ensure service level, anonymisation or pseudonymisation standards, interoperability and information security.

In this context, individual researchers in non-health settings, but especially small and medium-sized innovative companies, do not possess the necessary muscle and expertise to meet ethical and regulatory requirements. Therefore, the need to provide them with support in terms of the design of regulatory and ethical compliance models should not be neglected, if they are not to act as a barrier to entry or exclusion. 

This does not exclude or preclude regional efforts, those of foundations or reference hospitals, or nascent data infrastructures in the field of medical imaging of cancer or genomics. It is precisely the idea of a federation of data spaces that inspires European legislation that can bear fruit of the highest quality here. The Ministry of Health and public health departments should move in this direction, with the support of the new Ministry of Digital Transformation and Public Administration. The autonomous communities reflect and act on the development of governable models and participate, together with the Ministry of Health, in the governance model that should govern the national framework. Regulators such as the Spanish Data Protection Agency are providing viable frameworks for the development of data spaces. Entire hospitals design, implement and deploy information systems that seek to integrate hundreds of data sources and generate data lakes for research. Data infrastructures such as EUCAIM lead the way and generate high-quality know-how in highly specialised areas.

The work on the roll-out of a National Health Data Space, and each and every one of the unique initiatives underway, show us a way forward in which the federation of effort, solidarity and data sharing ensure that our privileged position in health digitisation stimulates leadership in research, innovation and digital entrepreneurship. The National Health Data Space will be able to offer differential value to stakeholders. It will provide data quality and volume, support advanced compute-intensive data analytics and AI tools and can provide security in software brokering processes for the processing of pseudonymised data with high requirements.

It is necessary to recall a core value for the European Union: the guarantee of fundamental rights and the human-centred approach. The Charter of Digital Rights promoted by the Spanish government proposes successively the right of access to data for scientific research, innovation and development purposes, as well as the right to the protection of health in the digital environment. The National Health Data Space is called to be the indispensable instrument to achieve a sustainable, inclusive digital health at the service of the common good, which at the same time boosts this dimension of the data economy, promoting research and entrepreneurship in our country. 

Content prepared by Ricard Martínez, Director of the Chair of Privacy and Digital Transformation. Professor, Department of Constitutional Law, Universitat de València. The contents and points of view reflected in this publication are the sole responsibility of its author.

The Council of Ministers approved in February this year the Sustainable Mobility Bill (PL), a commitment to a digital and innovative transport system in which open mobility data will play a key role.

Inaddition to regulating innovative solutions such as on-demand transport, car sharing or temporary use of vehicles, the regulation will encourage the promotion ofopen data by administrations, infrastructure managers and public and private operators. All this, as stated in Chapter III Title V of the Draft Law "will bring enormous benefits to citizens, e.g. for new mobility and their contribution to the European Green Pact".

This Bill is aligned with the European Data Strategy, which has among its objectives to create a single market for data that ensures Europe' s global competitiveness and data sovereignty through the creation of common European data spaces common European data spaces in nine strategic sectors. In particular, it foresees the creation and development of a common European mobility data space to put Europe at the forefront of the development of a smart transport system, including connected cars and other modes of transport. Along these lines, the European Commission presented its Sustainable and Intelligent Mobility Strategywhich includes an action dedicated to innovation, data and artificial intelligence for smarter mobility. Following in Europe's footsteps, Spain has launched this Sustainable Mobility Bill.

In this post we look at the benefits that the use of open data can bring to the sector, the obligations that the PL will place on data, and the next steps in building the Integrated Mobility Data Space.

Benefits of using open data on sustainable mobility

The Ministry of Transport and Sustainable Mobility, in the web section created for the Law, identifies some of the benefits that access to and use of open transport and mobility data can offer both to the business community and to public administrations and citizens in general:

• Encourage the development of applications that enable citizens to make decisions on the planning of their journeys and during the course of their journeys.
• Improve the conditions of service provision and the travel experience .
• Incentivise research, create new developments and businesses from the data generated in the transport and mobility ecosystem.
• Enable public administrations to have a better understanding of the transport and mobility system in order to improve the definition of public policies and the management of the system.
• Encourage the use of this data for other public interest purposes that may arise.

Ensuring access to open mobility data

In order to make good use of these data and thus take advantage of all the benefits they offer, the Draft Law determines a strategy to ensure the availability of open data in the field of transport and mobility. This strategy concerns:

•  transport companies and infrastructure managers, which must drive digitalisation and provide a significant part of the data, with specific characteristics and functionalities.
• administrations and public entities were already obliged to ensure the openness of their data by design, as well as its re-use on the basis of the already existing

In short, the guidelines for re-use already defined in Law 37/2007 for the public sector are respected, and the need to regulate access to this information and the way in which this data is used by third parties, i.e. companies in the sector, is also included.

Integrated Mobility Data Space

In line with the European Data Strategy mentioned at the beginning of the post, the PL determines the obligation to create the Integrated Mobility Data Space (EDIM) under the direction of the Ministry of Transport and Sustainable Mobility, in coordination with the Secretary of State for Digitalisation and Artificial Intelligence. In the EDIM, the aforementioned transport companies, infrastructure managers and administrations will share their data, which will optimise the decision making of all actors when planning the implementation of new infrastructures and the launch of new services. 

The Draft Law defines some characteristics of the Integrated Mobility Data Space such as the modular structure, which will include information in a systematic way on different areas of urban, metropolitan and interurban mobility, both for people and goods.

Specifically, the EDIM, according to Article 14, would collect data "in digital form in a free, non-discriminatory and up-to-date manner" on:

• Supply and demand of the different modes of transport and mobility, information on public transport services and mobility services under the responsibility of the administrations
• Financial situation and costs of providing services for all modes of public transport, investments in transport infrastructure, inventory of transport infrastructure and terminals, conditions and degree of accessibility.
• Other data to be agreed at the Sectoral Conference on Transport.

It identifies examples of this type of data and information on the responsibility for its provision, format, frequency of updating and other characteristics.

As referred to in the CP, the data and information managed by the EDIM will provide an integrated vision to analyse and facilitate mobility management, improving the design of sustainable and efficient solutions, and transparency in the design of public transport and mobility policies. In addition, the Law will promote the creation of a sandbox or test environment to serve as an incubator for innovative mobility projects. The outcome of the tests will allow both the developer and the administration to learn by observing the market in a controlled environment.

National Bimodal Transport Access Point

On the other hand, the Bill also provides for the creation of a National Bimodal Transport Access Point that will collect the information communicated to the Ministry of Transport and Sustainable Mobility in the framework of the priority action "Provision of information services on multimodal journeys throughout the Union" of Directive 2010/40/EU which refers to the transport of goods and/or persons by more than one means of transport.

This information will be freely accessible and will also serve to feed the EDIM in the area related to the characterisation of transport and mobility of persons, as well as the National Catalogue of Public Information maintained by the General State Administration.

The Bill defines that the provision of services to citizens using transport and mobility data from the National Multimodal Transport Access Point must be done in a fair, neutral, impartial, non-discriminatory and transparent manner. It adds that the Ministry of Transport and Sustainable Mobility will propose rules for the use of such data within 12 months after the entry into force of this law.

The Sustainable Mobility Bill is currently in parliamentary procedure, as it has been sent to the Spanish Parliament for urgent processing and approval in 2024.

Between 2 April and 16 May, applications for the call on aid for the digital transformation of strategic productive sectors may be submitted at the electronic headquarters of the Ministry for Digital Transformation and Civil Service. Order TDF/1461/2023, of 29 December, modified by Order TDF/294/2024, regulates grants totalling 150 million euros for the creation of demonstrators and use cases, as part of a more general initiative of Sectoral Data Spaces Program, promoted by the State Secretary for Digitalisation and Artificial Intelligence and framed within the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan (PRTR). The objective is to finance the development of data spaces and the promotion of disruptive innovation in strategic sectors of the economy, in line with the strategic lines set out in the Digital Spain Agenda 2026. 

Lines, sectors and beneficiaries

The current call includes funding lines for experimental development projects in two complementary areas of action: the creation of demonstration centres (development of technological platforms for data spaces); and the promotion of specific use cases of these spaces. This call is addressed to all sectors except tourism, which has its own call. Beneficiaries may be single entities with their own legal personality, tax domicile in the European Union, and an establishment or branch located in Spain. In the case of the line for demonstration centres, they must also be associative or representative of the value chains of the productive sectors in territorial areas, or with scientific or technological domains. 

Infographic-summary

The following infographics show the key information on this call for proposals:

Would you like more information? 

• Access to the grant portal for application proposals in the following link. On the portal you will find the regulatory bases and the call for applications, a summary of its content, documentation and informative material with presentations and videos, as well as a complete list of questions and answers. In the mailbox espaciosdedatos@digital.gob.es you will get help about the call and the application procedure. From this portal you can access the electronic office for the application. 
• Quick guide to the call for proposals in pdf + downloadable Infographics (on the Sectoral Data Program and Technical Information)
• Link to other documents of interest:

  • Action plan for the deployment of data spaces by Data Office.

  • How to evaluate and design 'use cases' for data spaces: guides to ease the way 

• Additional information on the data space concept 

The growing importance of data goes beyond the economic and social spheres at state level to a multinational dimension that raises the challenges, opportunities, threats and uncertainties surrounding the development of the Data Economy to a global scale. In the case of the European Union, the issue has been on the institutional agenda in recent years, as evidenced by the profusion of specific and cross-cutting regulations already adopted or in progress; or the promotion of multilateral initiatives both within the framework of the Union and beyond its borders. In July 2022, this global political dimension took a major qualitative leap forward with the adoption by the EU Council of what it called 'Conclusions on EU Digital Diplomacy'Conclusions on EU Digital Diplomacywhich aimed to set out priority actions to strengthen EU action in international digital affairs.

These conclusions - updated in July 2023 - are, in a way, a milestone in that they give the concept of 'digital diplomacy' a legal status. They recognised, on the one hand, the need for "stronger, strategic, coherent and effective" EU policy and action on digital issues; and detailed, on the other hand, priority actions to respond to that need.         

Three ways to engage with third countries

Under the title 'The European Data Strategy from a multidimensional perspectivethe think tank network PromethEUs1 published in June 2023 an analysis that breaks down the European Data Strategy from two main perspectives: the political and regulatory aspects, and the geopolitical aspects.. The analysis of the latter was prepared by Raquel Jorge Ricart of the Real Instituto Elcano, and explains that the EU has been addressing the way in which its goods, services, assets and personal data relate to third countries through various channels:

The analysis of the latter was carried out by the whose researchers explain that the EU has been addressing how its goods, services, assets and personal data relate to third countries through various channels:

1. The regulatory route, which, as they say, "has been closely followed by most stakeholders". 
2. Through multilateral initiatives, "coalitions of the willing" and international meetings.
3. "Through the importance of digital diplomacy, as a policy area to institutionalise the geopolitics of data, along with other technological challenges". In this sense, the term 'digital diplomacy' is used to bring together in a single 'box' all the initiatives that, independently, would have been carried out to date.

Further information on each of these pathways is provided below.

Regulatory pathway

In relation to the regulatory approach, the main challenge for the EU to deploy the regulatory tool as a geopolitical asset lies, according to the Elcano researchers, in influencing other countries to follow the same approach. "It is not just a matter of imposing standards on those who already interact with the EU, but of encouraging others to do the same with theirs," they say. Likewise, they add, "another challenge for the geopolitical instrumentalisation of these regulations is to understand that geopolitical strategies must vary according to the country and the type of technology company", as they may have different geopolitical approaches.

But, the authors conclude, regulation, while important, is not the only approach on which the EU should build its data geopolitics. The other two approaches are as important as they are strategic.

Multilateral initiatives

With regard to international forums for dialogue, the following stand out:

• Those maintained through institutionalised and long-standing organisations and spaces, e.g. G7, UN, OECD, etc.
•  More recently established issue-specific coalitions, such as the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (involving the US, Australia, India and Japan), Digital Economy Partnership Agreement (with Chile, New Zealand and Singapore) or the proposed Data Free Flow with Trust DFFT-2019 (driven by Japan).

Digital diplomacy

Regarding the third approach - the promotion of digital diplomacy - Elcano analysts highlight as positive the various regional technological partnership initiatives that the EU has deployed in recent years, and stress that already in 2019 'the EU began to see technology through the lens of ethics' and as a political and geopolitical issue. In this respect, they underline that the Conclusions of the European Council on Digital Diplomacy (July 2022) are the starting point "with which the EU institutionalised all aspects related to the external agenda in third countries and digital policy as a unique aspect of EU foreign policy". And that is why the goal of digital diplomacy deployed by the EU through its External Action Service is none other than to "secure the EU's global role in the digital world, protect its strategic interests and promote its dynamic and people-centred regulatory framework for an inclusive digital transformation".

The latter is, moreover, a crucial factor, as revealed by the priority actions set out at the initial European Council meeting in July 2022, revised in july 2023. The EU, says the Council, must promote a human rights-based and people-centred digital transformation, which translates, for example, into:

• Regular and thorough" human rights due diligence practices and human rights impact assessments.
• Pay special attention to the protection of the rights of vulnerable or marginalised people.
• Bridging the gender digital divide.
• Promote an open, free, neutral, global, interoperable, reliable and secure Internet.

The Spanish Charter of Digital Rightslaunched in July 2021, and the European Declaration on Digital Rights and Principles for the Digital Decadeare a clear example of the vocation with which the European Union wants to provide itself with an internal or domestic reference, while establishing a shared framework for its action in the field of digital diplomacy.

The EU's challenges

In any case, from the analysis of the different actions established by the EU in this area, the Elcano Institute's researchers identify three major challenges:

1. How to address the role of member states in EU data geopolitics, as most foreign and security policy provisions depend on the unanimity of all 27 countries, and this "may make it difficult for certain activities related to data governance to be approved".
2. How to partner with developing countries "or, particularly, with non-aligned countries", a concept that could be undergoing some revitalisation and which, they argue, "should be an area for further work". The global Gateway initiative would be in this area and, in fact, is one of those that the EU wants to promote by also broadening private sector participation.
3. How to "pay attention to certain technologies that are still underdeveloped, notyetwidely commercialised or not yet deployed, but which could generate a great deal of competition between countries".

In short, the development of digital diplomacy is already a crucial vector in the development of the Data Economy and, in fact, the EU Council will return to this issue before the summer of 2024, two years after the issuing of the Conclusions and one year since the first review. Indeed, until then, the Council "invites the High Representative, the Commission and Member States to assess progress on a regular basis and to continue to report regularly to the Council on the implementation of digital diplomacy". To take its diplomacy to the next level, they stress, "the EU must act with a Team Europe approach - that is, EU institutions and EU member states, together with other partner actors - jointly protecting its strategic interests and promoting its people-centred approach to the digital transition".

Economic security

The aforementioned link between digital diplomacy, the Union's strategic interests and the Data Economy underlies the European Economic Security Strategy a joint communication adopted by the Commission and the High Representative on 20 June 2023.  The strategy is based on a three-pillar approach:

• Promoting the EU's economic base and competitiveness
• Protection against risks
• Partnering with as many countries as possible to address common concerns and interests.

Fostering (competitiveness); preserving (economic security); and cooperating (with each other and with others) are the vectors that the Strategy defines to address the four risks it identifies. Namely:

1. Risks related to the resilience of supply chains.
2. Risks to the physical and cyber security of critical infrastructures.
3. Risks related to technology security and technology leaks.
4. Risks of economic dependencies being used as a weapon or economic coercion.

As a first follow-up to the Strategy, the Commission adopted on 3 October 2023 a Recommendation on critical technology areas for EU economic security, identifying ten critical technology areas, four of which are identified as "highly likely": advanced semiconductors, artificial intelligence, quantum technologies and biotechnologies.

In order to make immediate risk assessments on these areas, the Commission will deploy an intensive dialogue with Member States with results expected by spring 2024. A dialogue in which the Data Economy, with an increasingly relevant weight in European productive ecosystems, will be omnipresent. And Spain, as an international hub and secure destination for information flows and data storage, should pay special attention to aspects such as guaranteeing the correct integration of the different data infrastructures; guaranteeing interoperability between the different actors; and reinforcing its cybersecurity, especially in view of the vulnerability of the supply chain and the need to guarantee effective competition and diversity of suppliers.

A data space is the place where value is generated around data through voluntary sharing in an environment of sovereignty, trust and security. The data space enables you to determine who accesses what data and under what conditions, thus facilitating the deployment of different use cases to meet different business needs. The data space functions as an open and heterogeneous environment of providers and consumers of data products, with no dominant players and no disproportionate barriers to entry and exit.

The data space is the place for sustainable value generation around data, a catalyst for innovation and business growth, allowing to identify market opportunities, anticipate trends, make better informed decisions, increase operational efficiency, develop transformative products and services or personalise customer experiences.

Within the concept of data space, and beyond a bilateral exchange of information, there is room for both centralised environments of information aggregation and generation of value-added services, with or without financial compensation, and more innovative data sharing environments (typically federated and distributed). The former can be seen as fundamental building blocks for the latter, and in any case, full interoperability of the deployed solutions and their future scalability should be sought.

The data space is the ideal scenario for deploying a variety of advanced technologies to efficiently explore data sets and turn them into information. This creates an environment conducive to innovation and process optimisation, resulting in a landscape in which information becomes a strategic resource for growth and informed decision-making. The data space enables the use of advanced analytics tools (business intelligence, big data, machine learning, deep learning, etc.), generative algorithms (LLM, GPT), process automation (RPA), and/or advanced data preservation techniques (DLTs).

In practice, a data provider (formally incorporated in the corresponding data space) will make its data products accessible through a catalogue, managed according to the indications of the data space promoter. When a participant wishes to access a product, it will look for the availability of such information, studying its conditions of access and use, as well as the appropriateness of its semantics and vocabulary. If the characteristics detailed in the catalogue meet his/her expectations, he/she will establish the appropriate negotiation and proceed to establish an effective transfer between supplier and consumer, in accordance with the technical conditions set out in the catalogue.

What does the data space offer to each type of participant?

There are four types of participants in a data space:

1)    Data space promoter:

It is the driver of the sharing and operating environment, and will therefore be responsible for its governance and management (and may delegate some operational parts). It will therefore be the guarantor of the generation of community around the data space, articulating different business models and seeking and attracting new participants, thus dynamising innovation and the development of new value-added services.

Different business models can be generated within the data space. These include:

• Monetisation of data on a bilateral basis.
• Markets as a meeting point between suppliers and consumers.
• The marketing of software products or services for data analysis and exploitation.
• The facilitation of technological solutions to mediate the identification of participants or the exchange between them.
• The development of industrial platforms integrating the value chain.
• Making data openly available altruistically.

2) Providers of data sets and services:

They offer  data products (both sets and services) within the contours of rights and obligations defined by the data space developer .

Thanks to cybersecurity and the sovereignty capabilities it provides, the barriers and risks associated with sharing are lowered, thus facilitating the generation of value and the return on the investment involved in making resources available. Moreover, the technological uncertainties linked to the deployment of innovative business models are partially mitigated by the use of standard frameworks and solutions (provided by the technology specifier and the technology provider, respectively).

Providers of data sets and services can opt for different revenue generation models, such as:

• Provide free access to the data, thus seeking to generate a high volume of traffic to attract sponsors or advertisers.
• Deploy a type of freemiun access free of charge for specific data and services, but at a cost for specific or higher quality services and data.
• Establish temporary or continuous licensing agreements.
• Define dynamic costing systems linked to timely demand or complexity of access
• Deploy a collaborative sharing system where access to other people's data is linked to sharing one's own data ( quid-pro-quomodel).

3) Consumers of data sets and services:

They consume data products within the contours of rights and obligations defined by the data space developer.

It allows them to benefit by incorporating the value of third-party data (from different suppliers) into their system by consolidating or combining it with their own data. The information and knowledge generated from this shared data makes it possible to solve business problems that would be unmanageable on an individual basis, adding value to the business itself.

The value proposition of the data consumer can go through:

• Acting on one's own behalf, for personal consumption and profit.
• Acting as a data broker, connecting organisations with fewer resources or maturity, and thus offering trust.
• It plays the role of a reuser, which is able to generate value-added services on the data space by reworking the information provided.

Precisely in the sense of risk mitigation and confidence building, the use of standard solutions (provided by the technology provider of the data space, which we will see below) serves to ensure service levels(business continuity) and the reduction of technological risks, as well as to avoid registration on multiple platforms or the management of complex and diverse authorisation and access processes.

4) Technology provider:

It is in charge of integrating and operating the technical solution that enables the deployment of the data space infrastructure (on behalf of, under the governance and management of the developer). This provider will carry out the development, configuration and parameterisation to implement the technical solution to deploy the data space, practically as a service ready for consumption. For this purpose, a basic physical infrastructure will be used, on top of which technological components will be added to enable adequate management of participants' identities, as well as all other functionalities that characterise the data space in question (and which will typically follow a reference architecture).

The provider will therefore make precise use of different enabling technologies for the governance and management of the data space, from the deployment of privacy-enhancing technologies to ensure the proper treatment of protected information, to tools to automate contractual compliance and guarantee sovereignty.

It is important to note that this figure of the "data space technology provider" does not coincide with that of the data technology service provider within the already operational data space itself. The former deploys and operates the technologies necessary to shape the ecosystem, within which the latter operates, offering ad-hoc solutions (which could in any case include the former organisation, as permitted by the competition regulations of the sector in which the data space operates, as well as its specific governance).

Data has become the great transforming power of society. Beyond the more mercantilist view, its capacity to generate knowledge, drive innovation and empower individuals and communities is undeniable. Indeed, it is a resource with which to address, from an innovative perspective, major environmental, social and health challenges, enabling collaboration between actors, driving innovation and improving accountability.

Following European guidelines such as the European Data Strategy, the challenge now is to promote the circulation of data for the benefit of all, by pooling data in key sectors with the creation of  common and interoperabledata spaces. A data space is an ecosystem where the voluntary sharing of its participants' data takes place within an environment of sovereignty, trust and security, established through integrated governance, organisational, regulatory and technical mechanisms. Data spaces are key to the development of the data economy, enabling access, exchange and legitimate re-use, positioning data as a non-rivalrous resource, whose utility grows as its use becomes more widespread, in a clear example of the network effect.

What are the Coordinated Support Actions (CSA)?

In order to foster the development of data spaces, the European Commission's Digital Europe Programme (DIGITAL) is funding a series of Coordinated Support Actions (CSA) to foster their development. Most of these actions have a funding of around one million euros per project and a duration of approximately one year, with an expected completion date in the fourth quarter of 2023. Their results should contribute to the objectives of the DIGITAL programme, which aims to bridge the gap between research and deployment of digital technologies, and to facilitate the transfer of research results to the market, to the benefit of European citizens and businesses, especially small and medium-sized ones.

Each concrete action focuses on a particular sector of economic activity seeking, based on a mapping of the data landscape of each sector concerned, to contact and connect relevant stakeholders, seeking to collaboratively develop a shared strategic roadmap. This shared roadmap ultimately aims to eventually build up the corresponding sectoral data spacesin subsequent phases. During the process, clear objectives and key results are defined to inspire, support and motivate all stakeholders to contribute and use high quality sectoral data as a basis for innovation and value generation.

In order to carry out this roadmap, a comprehensive inventory of existing platforms that already share relevant data has been drawn up. In addition, each CSA project has focused, through different working groups and stakeholder workshops, on developing recommendations on governance models for data spaces and digital business models for their sector. The aim is to identify key success factors and outline how a data space can create value and benefits not only for the sector in question but also for other sectors with which it is interlinked. In addition, plans to address the technical and organisational challenges that drive the use of interoperability standards are made in the different projects in close collaboration with the Data Spatial Support Centre (DSSC) in order to align with the European Technological Framework for Data Spaces.

Where can I find up-to-date information on CSAs?

Concrete information on the state of play of the different coordination and support actions can be found on their websites through the following links:

	DATES (Tourism)
	Tourism Data Space (Tourism)
	DS4SKills (Skills)
	PrepDSpace4Mobility (Mobility)
	AgriDataSpace (Agri-food)
	Great (Environmental)
	DataSp4ce (Industrial)
	DS4SSCC (Smarts Cities)

The outcome of these coordinated support actions will provide the information and the basis for the correct execution of the projects for the development and implementation (\"deployments\") of the Common European Data Spaces, which will be supported by different European programmes. This will catalyse the creation of a single data market, based on reliable and quality data, which will enable the digitisation of industries' value chains. Moreover, its effective development will support the European Union's objectives of achieving a green transition and a digital transformation, and of strengthening its resilience and strategic autonomy.

Building Europe's digital infrastructure of tomorrow

As a global technology race unfolds, Europe is deploying the regulatory framework and investments needed to foster innovation and technological leadership in areas such as online platforms, artificial intelligence, data, cloud, quantum technologies and virtual worlds. In today's rapidly changing economic context, a state-of-the-art telecommunications infrastructure is a key pillar for growth, innovation and job creation.

For this technological revolution to succeed, says EC Internal Market Commissioner Thierry Breton, it must be ensured that European networks are up to the task in terms of transmission speed, storage capacity, computing power and interoperability. To this end, it will seek to promote a Digital Networks Act that will serve to redefine the DNA of Europe's telecommunications sector.

Exploratory consultation on the future of the electronic communications sector and its infrastructure

From 23 February to 19 May 2023, the European Commission conducted an exploratory consultation on the future of the electronic communications sector and its infrastructure. The aim was to gather views from different stakeholders, in particular on the technological and market changes affecting the sector, as well as the types of infrastructure and investments that Europe is expected to need to lead the digital transformation in the coming years. The consultation was divided into four areas: (i) technological and market developments, (ii) fairness for consumers, (iii) barriers to the single market and (iv) fair contribution of all digital actors.

The Commission received close to 500 responses to the consultation from different interest groups such as companies (including network providers as well as large traffic generators), business associations, citizens, non-governmental organisations, academic institutions, consumer organisations and trade unions, as well as comments from public authorities. Most of the responses came from the EU, although there were also participants from other invited countries such as the United States and the United Kingdom.

From the exploratory consultation on the future of the electronic communications sector and its infrastructure, the following conclusions can be drawn:

• The need for innovation and efficient investment in technologies such as network virtualisation, artificial intelligence, open networks and perimeter cloud (in that order of importance), recognising that these will have a substantial impact on the sector in the coming years by driving cost reductions. Network virtualisation is expected to be the technology with the greatest impact by enabling greater flexibility and improved network efficiency, offering a great opportunity to develop new business models. In terms of investment, most respondents expect that a significant part of their annual revenues in the coming years (up to 50% of revenues) will have to be spent on investments in connectivity infrastructure and replacement of devices from providers considered high risk. Public funding is seen as crucial, but questions remain as to whether it will be enough and how to attract more private investment.
• The second conclusion, relating to consumer equity, is that the majority of respondents indicate that overall broadband access prices will decrease in the coming years, although there is more discrepancy when considering high transmission speeds. There is also no consensus among respondents on the effectiveness/efficiency of the Universal Service Obligation rules to protect consumers with special needs, and there is also disagreement on whether it should continue to be financed by the public budget or by network providers.
• It also points to the importance of harnessing the single market to drive investment and innovation, cooperating on key technology developments, and standardising technologies and platform building, so as to support the deployment of initiatives based on federated, interoperable and open source models. The majority of responses indicate that streamlining and simplifying regulation by harmonising best practices at EUlevel would serve to reduce administrative burdens, supply chain and/or regulatory costs, thereby increasing efficiency and speed of infrastructure deployment.
• The fourth conclusion focuses on the need to protect EU networks. In an interconnected world with growing geopolitical tensions, security is critical. Despite advances in the security of 5G networks, gaps remain in the protection of network infrastructure. A more coordinated European approach, especially with regard to further integration of radio spectrum, and with a better aligned auction model and licensing conditions between regions, could improve coverage in border areas and strengthen the EU against harmful external interference.
• Finally, as regards the contribution of digital players to network roll-out, several telco providers anticipate a negative outlook for the next 5 years, driven by the continued fall in unit prices (in terms of EUR/Mbps), which offset the potential revenues from increased data traffic and, therefore, to the detriment of the investments needed to support such traffic. More than half of the respondents answered in the affirmative on the question of whether large digital players should contribute in a fair and proportionate way to the costs of public goods, services and infrastructure, and on the potential introduction of a mandatory mechanism for direct payments from content application providers.

The role of communications networks in the development of data spaces

The data spaces are ecosystems from which to realise the voluntary sharing of data among their participants, based on the creation of an environment of sovereignty, trust and cybersecurity. In contrast to traditional monolithic models, data spaces are virtual, federated environmentsand are therefore established through integrated governance, organisational, regulatory and technical mechanisms.

Data spaces ensure that a large amount of data and algorithms are available for use in the economy and society, while the companies, organisations and individuals that generate these resources retain control over them. As such, these data sets and algorithms will aspire to maintain their residence in the computer systems of their respective owners, connecting with others on an ad hoc basis according to precise needs, which is why data spaces require a renewed infrastructure of communication networks. Based on 5G (or even 6G) technology, data transmission with lower latency and higher capacity is enabled, and also drives the development of edge computing solutions (edge computing), which allow added flexibility for the emerging European Data Economy.

Likewise, operators, through initiatives such as Open Gateway, will also be able to transform their telecommunication networks into value-added platforms, making their capabilities more flexible and available through standardised APIs, with which to develop new applications and digital solutions of greater complexity and scope. Such developments may encourage the participation, collaboration and interoperability of the different actors in the data spaces, with telecommunications operators also playing an important role as facilitators, not only in the development of use cases, but also in the implementation and operation of these use cases.

The regulatory approach in the European Union has taken a major turn since the first regulation on the reuse of public sector information was promoted in 2003. Specifically, as a consequence of the European Data Strategy approved in 2020, the regulatory approach is being expanded from at least two points of view:   

• on the one hand, governance models are being promoted that take into account the need to integrate, from the design and by default, respect for other legally relevant rights and interests, such as the protection of personal data, intellectual property or commercial secrecy, as has happened in particular through the Data Governance Regulation;   

• on the other hand, extending the subjective scope of the rules to go beyond the public sector, so that obligations specifically aimed at private entities are also beginning to be contemplated, as shown by the approval in November 2023 of the Regulation on harmonized rules for fair access to and use of data (known as the Data Act). 

In this new approach, data spaces take on a singular role, both in terms of the importance of the sectors they deal with (health, mobility, environment, energy...) and, above all, because of the important role they are called upon to play in facilitating the availability of large amounts of data, specifically in overcoming the technical and legal obstacles that hinder their sharing. In this regard, in Spain we already have a legal provision in this regard, which has materialized with the creation of a specific section in the Public Sector Procurement Platform.  

The Strategy itself envisages the creation of "a common European data space for public administrations, in order to improve transparency and accountability of public spending and the quality of spending, fight corruption at both national and EU level, and address compliance needs, as well as support the effective implementation of EU legislation and encourage innovative applications". At the same time, however, it is recognized that "data concerning public procurement are disseminated through various systems in the Member States, are available in different formats and are not user-friendly", concluding the need, in many cases, to "improve the quality of the data". 

Why a data space in the field of public procurement?  

Within the activity carried out by public entities, public procurement stands out, whose relevance in the economy of the EU as a whole reaches almost 14% of GDP, so it is a strategic pole to boost a more innovative, competitive and efficient economy. However, as expressly recognized in the Commission's Communication Public Procurement: A Data Space to improve public spending, boost data-driven policy making and improve access to tenders for SMEs published in March 2023, although there is a large amount of data on public procurement, however "at the moment its usefulness for taxpayers, public decision-makers and public purchasers is scarce".  

The regulation on public procurement approved in 2014 incorporated a strong commitment to the use of electronic media in the dissemination of information related to the call for tenders and the awarding of procedures, although this regulation suffers from some important limitations: 

• refers only to contracts that exceed certain minimum thresholds set at European level, which limits the measure to 20% of public procurement in the EU, so that it is up to the States themselves to promote their own transparency measures for the rest of the cases;  

• does not affect the contractual execution phase, so that it does not apply to such relevant issues as the price finally paid, the execution periods actually consumed or, among other issues, possible breaches by the contractor and, if applicable, the measures adopted by the public entities in this respect;  

• although it refers to the use of electronic media when complying with the obligation of transparency, it does not, however, contemplate the need for it to be articulated on the basis of open formats that allow the automated reuse of the information. 

Certainly, since the adoption of the 2014 regulation, significant progress has been made in facilitating the standardization of the data collection process, notably by imposing the use of electronic forms for the above-mentioned thresholds as of October 25, 2023. However, a more ambitious approach was needed to "fully leverage the power of procurement data". To this end, this new initiative envisages not only measures aimed at decisively increasing the quantity and quality of data available, but also the creation of an EU-wide platform to address the current dispersion, as well as the combination with a set of tools based on advanced technologies, notably artificial intelligence. 

The advantages of this approach are obvious from several points of view:   

• on the one hand, it could provide public entities with more accurate information for planning and decision-making;   

• on the other hand, it would also facilitate the control and supervision functions of the competent authorities and society in general;   

• and, above all, it would give a decisive boost to the effective access of companies and, in particular, of SMEs to information on current or future procedures in which they could compete. 

What are the main challenges to be faced from a legal point of view?  

The Communication on the European Public Procurement Data Space is an important initiative of great interest in that it outlines the way forward, setting out the potential benefits of its implementation, emphasizing the possibilities offered by such an ambitious approach and identifying the main conditions that would make it feasible. All this is based on the analysis of relevant use cases, the identification of the key players in this process and the establishment of a precise timetable with a time horizon up to 2025.  

The promotion of a specific European data space in the field of public procurement is undoubtedly an initiative that could potentially have an enormous impact both on the contractual activity of public entities and also on companies and, in general, on society as a whole. But for this to be possible, major challenges would also have to be addressed from a legal perspective: 

Firstly, there are currently no plans to extend the publication obligation to contracts below the thresholds set at European level, which would mean that most tenders would remain outside the scope of the area. This limitation poses an additional consequence, as it means leaving it up to the Member States to establish additional active publication obligations on the basis of which to collect and, if necessary, integrate the data, which could pose a major difficulty in ensuring the integration of multiple and heterogeneous data sources, particularly from the perspective of interoperability. In this respect, the Commission intends to create a harmonized set of data which, if they were to be mandatory for all public entities at European level, would not only allow data to be collected by electronic means, but also to be translated into a common language that facilitates their automated processing. 

Secondly, although the Communication urges States to "endeavor to collect data at both the pre-award and post-award stages", it nevertheless makes contract completion notices voluntary. If they were mandatory, it would be possible to "achieve a much more detailed understanding of the entire public procurement cycle", as well as to encourage corrective action in legally questionable situations, both as regards the legal position of the companies that were not awarded the contracts and of the authorities responsible for carrying out audit functions. 

Another of the main challenges for the optimal functioning of the European data space is the reliability of the data published, since errors can often slip in when filling in the forms or, even, this task can be perceived as a routine activity that is sometimes carried out without paying due attention to its execution, as has been demonstrated by administrative practice in relation to the CPVs. Although it must be recognized that there are currently advanced tools that could help to correct this type of dysfunction, the truth is that it is essential to go beyond the mere digitization of management processes and make a firm commitment to automated processing models that are based on data and not on documents, as is still common in many areas of the public sector. Based on these premises, it would be possible to move forward decisively from the interoperability requirements referred to above and implement the analytical tools based on emerging technologies referred to in the Communication. 

The necessary adaptation of European public procurement regulations  

Given the relevance of the objectives proposed and the enormous difficulty involved in the challenges indicated above, it seems justified that such an ambitious initiative with such a significant potential impact should be articulated on the basis of a solid regulatory foundation. It is essential to go beyond recommendations, establishing clear and precise legal obligations for the Member States and, in general, for public entities, when managing and disseminating information on their contractual activity, as has been proposed, for example, in the health data space.  

In short, almost ten years after the approval of the package of directives on public procurement, perhaps the time has come to update them with a more ambitious approach that, based on the requirements and possibilities of technological innovation, will allow us to really make the most of the huge amount of data generated in this area. Moreover, why not configure public procurement data as high-value data under the regulation on open data and reuse of public sector information? 

Two of the European Union's most relevant data regulations will soon articulate the legal contours that will delineate the development of the data economy in the coming years. The Data Governance Act (DGA) has been fully applicable since September 24, 2023, while the wording of the Data Act (DA) was approved on November 27. 

They are not the only ones, as the legal framework already includes other important rules that regulate interconnected matters, thus revealing the proactive approach of the European Union in establishing rules of the game in line with the needs of European citizens and businesses. These guidelines provide the necessary legal security environment to achieve the ultimate goal of promoting a European Digital Single Market.  

 In the case of the DGA and the DA, the negotiations for their approval have shown that their objectives were shared by the stakeholders concerned. For both, data is a central element for digital transformation, and they share an interest in eliminating or reducing the barriers and obstacles to its sharing. They thus assume that data-driven innovation will bring enormous benefits to citizens and the economy. Therefore, creating legal frameworks that facilitate such processes is a common goal for companies, institutions and citizens. 

The contributions from the academic, business and associative worlds have been abundant and enriching, both for the drafting phase of the standards and for what will be their implementation and development in practice. One of the most reiterated questions is the concern about how the different standards of this 'digital regulatory package' will interact. Particularly important is the interaction with the General Data Protection Regulation, which is why DGA and DA have established general guidelines on the pre-eminence of said regulation in case of conflict. In this regard, the increase in regulation does not prevent specific situations from arising in practice around key concepts in the field of personal data, such as consent, purposes of processing, anonymization, or portability. 

Another of the issues highlighted has to do with the search for synergies between this regulation and current or future data business models. The recognized overall goal is to boost the development of data spaces and the data economy as a whole. This goal will be closer to the extent that the 'regulatory burden' does not reduce the incentives for companies to invest in collecting and managing data; that it does not weaken the competitive position of European companies (by adequately protecting trade secrets, intellectual property rights and confidentiality); and that there is an appropriate balance between general and business interests. 

The case of the Data Governance Act  

In the case of the DGA, the provisions related to data brokering services ––one of the central parts of the regulation–– occupied a significant part of the previous analyses carried out. For example, the question was raised as to what extent SMEs and start-ups could compete with large technology companies in the provision of these services; or whether, by requiring the structural separation required of data brokering service providers (through a separate legal entity), there could be problems related to other functionalities of the same companies.    

Along the same lines, the question arises as to whether a more decentralized data economy requires new intermediaries, or whether under the new legal formulation, they can successfully compete in data markets through alternative, non-vertically integrated business models. 

Considerations on the deployment of the Data Act  

With regard to the DA, the final wording of the regulation clarified its scope, the definition of concepts and the categorization of data, as suggested by the industry. The specific sectoral application to be developed subsequently will further define those concepts and interpretations that provide the desirable legal certainty.  

This legal certainty has also been argued in relation to trade secrets, intellectual property rights and confidentiality; an aspect that the Regulation seeks to address with safeguards aimed at preventing misuse and fraud. 

Other aspects that attracted attention were compensation for making data available; dispute resolution procedures; provisions on unfair contract terms (aimed at compensating for imbalances in bargaining power); making data available in case of exceptional need; and, finally, provisions on switching from one data processing service provider to another.  

 A positive starting point  

The starting point, in any case, is positive. The data economy in the European Union is taking hold on the basis of the European Data Strategy and the regulatory package that develops it. There are also practical examples of the potential of the industrial ecosystems that are being deployed around the Common European Data Spaces in sectors such as tourism, mobility and logistics, and agri-food, among others. In addition, initiatives that bring together public and private interests in this area are making significant progress in the deployment of technical and governance foundations, strengthening the competitive position of European companies, and achieving the ultimate goal of a single data market in the European Union. 

Click here for an extended version of this note. 

The European Union aims to boost the Data Economy by promoting the free flow of data between member states and between strategic sectors, for the benefit of businesses, researchers, public administrations and citizens. Undoubtedly, data is a critical factor in the industrial and technological revolution we are experiencing, and therefore one of the EU's digital priorities is to capitalise on its latent value, relying on a single market where data can be shared under conditions of security and, above all, sovereignty, as this is the only way to guarantee indisputable European values and rights.

Thus, the European Data Strategy seeks to enhance the exchange of data on a large scale, under distributed and federated environments, while ensuring cybersecurity and transparency. To achieve scale, and to unlock the full potential of data in the digital economy, a key element is building trust. This, as a basic element that conditions the liquidity of the ecosystem, must be developed coherently across different areas and among different actors (data providers, users, intermediaries, service platforms, developers, etc.). Therefore, their articulation affects different perspectives, including business and functional, legal and regulatory, operational, and even technological. Therefore, success in these highly complex projects depends on developing strategies that seek to minimise barriers to entry for participants, and maximise the efficiency and sustainability of the services offered. This in turn translates into the development of data infrastructures and governance models that are easily scalable, and that provide the basis for effective data exchange to generate value for all stakeholders.

A methodology to boost data spaces

Spain has taken on the task of putting this European strategy into practice, and has been working for years to create an environment conducive to facilitating the deployment and establishment of a Sovereign Data Economy, supported, among other instruments, by the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan. In this sense, and from its coordinating and enabling role, the Data Office has made efforts to design a general conceptual methodology , agnostic to a specific sector. It shapes the creation of data ecosystems around practical projects that bring value to the members of the ecosystem.

Therefore, the methodology consists of several elements, one of them being experimentation. This is because, by their flexible nature, data can be processed, modelled and thus interpreted from different perspectives. For this reason, experimentation is key to properly calibrate those processes and treatments needed to reach the market with pilots or business cases already close to the industries, so that they are closer to generating a positive impact. In this sense, it is necessary to demonstrate tangible value and underpin its sustainability, which implies, as a minimum, having:

• Frameworks for effective data governance
• Actions to improve the availability and quality of data, also seeking to increase their interoperability by design
• Tools and platforms for data exchange and exploitation.

Furthermore, given that each sector has its own specificity in terms of data types and semantics, business models, and participants' needs, the creation of communities of experts, representing the voice of the market, is another key element in generating useful projects. Based on this active listening, which leads to an understanding of the dynamics of data in each sector, it is possible to characterise the market and governance conditions necessary for the deployment of data spaces in strategic sectors such as tourism, mobility, agri-food, commerce, health and industry.

In this process of community building, data co-operatives play a fundamental role, as well as the more general figure of the data broker, which serves to raise awareness of the existing opportunity and favour the effective creation and consolidation of these new business models.

All these elements are different pieces of a puzzle with which to explore new business development opportunities, as well as to design tangible projects to demonstrate the differential value that data sharing will bring to the reality of industries. Thus, from an operational perspective, the last element of the methodology is the development of concrete use cases. These will also allow the iterative deployment of a catalogue of reusable experience and data resources in each sector to facilitate the construction of new projects. This catalogue thus becomes the centrepiece of a common sectoral and federated platform, whose distributed architecture also facilitates cross-sectoral interconnection.

On the shoulders of giants

It should be noted that Spain is not starting from scratch, as it already has a powerful ecosystem of innovation and experimentation in data, offering advanced services. We therefore believe it would be interesting to make progress in the harmonisation or complementarity of their objectives, as well as in the dissemination of their capacities in order to gain capillarity. Furthermore, the proposed methodology reinforces the alignment with European projects in the same field, which will serve to connect learning and progress from the national level to those made at EU level, as well as to put into practice the design tasks of the "cyanotypes" promulgated by the European Commission through the Data Spaces Support Centre.

Finally,the promotion of experimental or pilot projects also enables the development of standards for innovative data technologies, which is closely related to the Gaia-X project. Thus, the Gaia-X Hub Spain has an interoperability node, which serves to certify compliance with the rules prescribed by each sector, and thus to generate the aforementioned digital trust based on their specific needs.

At the Data Office, we believe that the interconnection and future scalability of data projects are at the heart of the effort to implement the European Data Strategy, and are crucial to achieve a dynamic and rich Data Economy, but at the same time a guarantor of European values and where traceability and transparency help to collectivise the value of data, catalysing a stronger and more cohesive economy.