Red.es

At the epicentre of global innovation that defines Mobile World Congress (MWC), a space has emerged where human talent takes centre stage: the Talent Arena.

The 2026 edition, promoted by Mobile World Capital Barcelona, brought together professionals, technology companies, training centres and emerging talent between 2 and 4 March with a common goal: to learn, connect and explore new opportunities in the digital field. At this event, Red.es actively participated with several sessions focused on one of the great current challenges: how to promote digital transformation through talent, training and innovation. Among them was the workshop "Open Data in Spain. From theory to practice with datos.gob.es", a session that focused on the strategic role of open data and its connection with emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence.

In this post we review the contents of the presentation that combined:

• A didactic look at the evolution, current state and future of open data in Spain
• A hands-on workshop on creating a conversational agent with MCP

What is open data? Evolution and milestones

The session began by establishing a fundamental pillar: the importance of open data in today's ecosystem. Beyond their technical definition – data that can be freely used, reused and shared by anyone, for any purpose – the talk underscored that their true power lies in the transformative impact they generate.

As addressed in the workshop, this data comes from multiple sources (public administrations, universities, companies and even citizens) and its openness allows:

• Promote institutional transparency, by facilitating access to public information.
• Encourage innovation, by enabling developers and businesses to create new services.
• Generate economic and social value, from the reuse of information in multiple sectors, such as health, education or the environment.

One of the key aspects of the workshop was to contextualize the historical evolution of open data. Although the first antecedents date back to the 50s and 60s, the modern concept of "open data" began to consolidate in the 90s. Subsequently, milestones such as the Memorandum on Transparency and Open Government (2007-2009) or the creation of the Open Government Partnership in 2011 marked a turning point at the international level.

In Spain, this development has been supported by a solid regulatory framework, such as Law 37/2007, which establishes key principles:

• Default opening of public data, especially high-value data.
• Creation of interoperable catalogs.
• Promotion of the reuse of information.
• Establishment of units responsible for data management.

The role of datos.gob.es: the national open data portal

At the heart of this ecosystem is datos.gob.es, the national open data portal, which acts as a unified access point to the public information available in Spain.

During the workshop, it was explained how this platform has evolved over time: from a few hundred datasets to hosting more than 100,000 today. It has also been incorporating new functionalities and adapting to international standards such as DCAT-AP and its national adaptation DCAT-AP-ES. These standards allow metadata to be structured in an interoperable way, facilitating integration between different catalogs.

Check here the Practical Guide to Implementing DCAT-AP-ES step by step

In addition, the data federation process in datos.gob.es was detailed  , which ensures that data from different sources can be integrated in a consistent and accessible way.

Despite the progress, the presentation also addressed the remaining challenges:

• Data quality and updating.
• Standardization and interoperability.
• Security and access control, especially in AI-connected environments.
• Training of users, both technical and non-technical.

Figure 1. Photo taken during the Talent Arena presentation at the Mobile World Congress. The photo shows the slide from the presentation explaining the concept of open data. Source: own elaboration - datos.gob.es.

From data to intelligence: the leap to AI

One of the most innovative elements of the workshop was its practical approach, focused on the application of artificial intelligence to open data. This is where the Model Context Protocol (MCP) came into play, an open standard that allows you to connect language models (Large Language Model or LLM) with external data sources in real time.

The initial problem that the workshop had to answer is how AI models, on their own, do not have up-to-date access to information or external systems. This limits their usefulness in real contexts. One solution may be to develop an MCP that acts as a "bridge" between the model and data sources, enabling:

• Access up-to-date information.
• Execute actions on external systems.
• Integrate multiple data sources securely.

In simple words, it is about connecting the "brain" (the AI model) with the "tools" (databases, APIs, internal systems).

The exercise, which took place live in the Talent Arena, began with a simple example: creating a database of film preferences and developing an MCP that would allow it to be consulted using natural language.

From there, key concepts were introduced:

• Identification of the intention of the model.
• Function calling.
• Generation of natural language responses from structured data.

This approach allows us to abstract the technical complexity and bring the use of data closer to non-specialized profiles.

The next step was to apply this same approach to the datos.gob.es catalog. Through its API, it's possible. First, it allows you to search for datasets by title and filter by topic; then through the API you can obtain detailed information about a dataset and access catalog statistics.

The MCP developed in the workshop acted as an intermediary between the AI model and this API, allowing complex queries to be made using natural language. 

This exercise combined a local database (SQLite) and the consumption of external data through an API, all integrated through an MCP server that allowed these functionalities to be exposed as accessible tools. The goal was to understand how to structure data, query it, and make it available to other AI systems or models in an organized way.

The full code is available as an attachment to this post in Python Notebook format.

This exercise is a sign of the enormous opportunities before us. The combination of open data and artificial intelligence can:

• Democratize access to information.
• Accelerate innovation.
• Improve decision-making in the public and private sectors.

In summary, the workshop "Open Data in Spain. From theory to practice with datos.gob.es" highlighted a fundamental idea: data, by itself, does not generate value. It is their use, interpretation and combination with other technologies that allows them to be transformed into knowledge and real solutions.

The evolution of open data in Spain shows that much progress has been made in recent years. However, the real potential is yet to be exploited, especially in its integration with technologies such as artificial intelligence. Events like Talent Arena 2026 serve precisely that: connecting ideas, sharing knowledge, and exploring new ways of doing things.

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) play a major role in the Spanish economy. 99% of companies in our country have fewer than 50 workers, and employ 50% of the workforce. Although many of these SMEs have already begun their transformation towards digitalization, it is true that there is still some way to go. According to the latest DESI report, 62% of Spanish SMEs have at least a basic level of digital intensity. However, they are below the European average in the use of cloud services or Big data analysis, all capabilities that can generate great benefits and opportunities for companies.

Among the advantages of digital transformation, we find the boost in productivity, time and cost reduction, improved customer experience... and also greater ease in collecting, combining and analysing data, promoting greater knowledge of what is happening inside and outside the company for better decision making. 

To boost the digital transformation of SMEs, the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Digital Transformation has launched Acela pyme, a program that offers advice, training and high-value services to take advantage of all the benefits of the digital world.

What is Acelera Pyme?

Acelera pyme is a program developed by Red.es, under the Secretary of State for Digitalization and Artificial Intelligence, which seeks to build the reference ecosystem for the digital transformation of Spanish SMEs.

This action is part of the SME Digitalization Plan 2021 - 2025, aligned with the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan and the 2025 Digital Spain agenda. With a budget of more than 4,000 million euros, it includes 16 actions structured into 5 lines of action: basic digitalization of SMEs, support and management of change, disruptive innovation, digital entrepreneurship and support for sectoral digitalization.

The Acelera pyme program is aimed at SMEs of any size, sector and level of digitalization. It has three main lines of action:

• Acelera pyme platform. This is a digital meeting point for SMEs and the agents involved in their digitalization. It includes general resources, as well as other specific resources by sector of activity. On this platform you can find various contents (success stories, news, interviews, audio-visual resources, reports, etc.) to expand knowledge, as well as self-assessment tools to know the level of digital maturity of a company and identify areas for improvement. Currently available is the trade sector, which centralizes all the specific information of great value for the digitization of this sector and the development of e-commerce.
• Acelera pyme office network. Following the signing of an agreement with the Spanish Chamber of Commerce and other agents, a network of physical offices has been set up throughout the country.  These offices provide on-site and remote assistance for the resolution of queries, including advice and information on access to public and private financing.
• Support and Advisory Services. The program includes technical and specialized support, as well as seminars and practical workshops throughout Spain.

Self-assessment tools

As mentioned above, one of the resources available on the Acelera pyme platform are the self-assessment tools. These are a series of tests and questionnaires to determine the degree of digitization achieved. Specifically, users can currently take three tests:

• Digital diagnostic test, to know the level of digital intensity according to DESI and the situation compared to other SMEs in Spain.
• Digital transformation self-assessment, to find out the specific level of maturity in various areas of digitization.
• Cybersecurity self-assessment, to discover the company's level of maturity in cybersecurity.

By performing these tests, the company obtains a roadmap with steps to be taken, as well as specific information on each area of digitization.

To access this service, prior registration is required.

The Digital Kit Program

Among the actions of Red.es and the Secretary of State for Digitalization and Artificial Intelligence to promote the transformation of SMEs and the self-employed is also the launch of the Digital Kit, a program of financial aid that provides access to a large catalog of digital solutions. It consists of a digital voucher, which users can redeem to choose between different services offered by a series of digitalizing agents. These services are as follows:

Those who want to access the digital bonus, must first register in Acelera pyme and complete the digital diagnostic test. Once this step has been completed, and the digital solutions to be implemented have been chosen, the application must be made through the electronic headquarters of Red.es. The complete information is included in the Regulatory Bases for the granting of aid for digitization.

Digital transformation involves not only an optimization of processes, by incorporating technologies that boost efficiency or informed decision-making, but can also bring new opportunities and business models, many of them related to the world of data. The aim of these actions is to boost the competitive capacity of SMEs, boosting the Spanish economy, entrepreneurship and innovation.

The State Secretariat for the Information Society and the Digital Agenda (SESIAD), together with the Public Business Entity Red.es, organize the first Hackathon of Language Technology with the goal of promoting  the development of technological applications based on the natural language processing and the automatic translation through the creation of open source prototypes with concrete functionalities related to this area.  

The competition consists of two phases: first, the participants will have to present their ideas on the theme: "How to apply Open Language Technologies", in particular, a proposal of an open source within 15 calendar days once the list of admissions is published.

The 10 best prototype proposals will go to the second phase, selected by a jury that will choose the candidates according to the criteria established in the conditions of the hackathon and assessing:

• The degree of innovation, originality and creativity in the area of language technologies.
• The feasibility of the prototype.
• The utility of the proposal, taking into account the difficulty level of the problem it solves, the number of potential recipients, etc.

The selected participants will participate, next February 27 in Barcelona, in a competition where they will develop and present, at the 4YFN 2017 event, the proposed open-source prototypes in which any programming language can be used.

The participation in this first Hackathon of Technology of Language is free and open to any physical, legal or business person who meets the terms and conditions, available on the website of Red.es, and submits the form before January 16.