Proposed workshops are expected to run for 60 or 90 minutes, although longer formats may be considered. The number of workshops selected will depend on the volume and quality of submissions. Where multiple proposals address closely related topics, the Data Week Programme Committee may recommend the consolidation of sessions.

Across all themes, workshops should contribute to strengthening Europe’s competitiveness and strategic autonomy in data and AI, while responding to the needs of both industry and the public sector. Proposals may be sector-specific or cross-sectoral and should clearly outline pathways to impact, deployment and adoption across European value chains. Particular emphasis is placed on the involvement of SMEs and start-ups, their contribution to innovation and market uptake, and on industrial perspectives that connect research and experimentation with real-world implementation. Where relevant, workshops are also encouraged to address international cooperation, promoting interoperability, standards alignment and global collaboration in data and AI.

Part of the programme is being constructed based on an open call for workshops or contributions, targeting the BDVA community but open to all organisations interested in engaging with the BDVA activities. BDVA members, BDVA Task Forces, Data and AI Projects, and other collaboration partners are invited to submit proposals. We invite workshop proposals within the broad scope of BDVA activities, with a special emphasis on topics that advance our Strategic Agenda, strategic priorities, BDVA Task Forces, objectives, and collaborative initiatives. In particular, we welcome contributions that align with the goals and themes of the AI Continent Action Plan and the Data Union Strategy, as well as those that build on and extend the insights in our latest BDVA position papers. Topics of interest include, but are not limited to:

• Data for AI ecosystems, frameworks, tools and access (Data4AI)
• DataLabs
• Compliance and reporting
• European data spaces and interoperable data infrastructures
• Integrated AI lifecycle and infrastructure
• Industrial AI
• AI models and model ecosystems (including foundation models, domain-specific and industry-tailored models, multimodal models, and model adaptation and reuse)
• Trustworthy, responsible, and human-centric AI
• AI in Science
• Privacy-enhancing technologies, synthetic data, and secure data processing
• Evolution of data analytics (including e.g. advanced and augmented analytics, real-time and streaming analytics, analytics for AI systems, data-centric AI, …)
• Next-generation AI and Big Data architectures, including agentic AI systems, distributed and federated AI, edge–cloud–HPC continuums, and emerging scalable and energy-efficient Big Data and AI architectures
• Quantum technologies, data and AI
• Emergent topics on data and AI
• Experimentation environments
• Skills, education, and talent development
• Privacy-enhancing technologies, synthetic data, and secure data processing
• Policy and standards implementation for AI and data
• Business models, value creation, and market uptake
• Digital Twins
• Virtual Worlds

How to apply 

Fill out this online form !

Timeline  

• Call for workshops: 19 January – 9 February (12 PM CET – midday; CLOSED REGISTRATION) 
• Communication of results (tentative): 2 March
• All workshops are expected to be confirmed, fully described and online by 16 March

Criteria for selection 

Data Week 2026 Programme Committee will select the sessions to be added as a part of the event programme. For optimising the chances of getting selected, make sure your application ticks these boxes: 

• Synergies and collaboration (sessions building synergies with other communities, bringing together several projects and/or BDVA Task Forces, etc.) 
• Relevance/added value of the session/workshop (why is your session relevant for the topic) 
• Audience engagement during the workshop  
• Contribution to BDVA Strategic objectives and BDVA Task Forces

More information

If you have any questions, do not hesitate to contact us at dataweek@bdva.eu 

We are looking forward to your proposals.

The post Data Week 2026: Call for workshops and contributions! appeared first on BDV Big Data Value Association.

Over 470 participants took part in 43 high-level plenaries, sessions, panels and parallel sessions over three days. 180 speakers were featured in the programme, which was organised based on themes from a sectorial and cross-sectorial angle. EBDVF benefited from the support of 53 sponsors.

EBDVF brings together industry every year professionals, business developers, researchers and policy-makers from all over Europe and other regions of the world to advance policy actions and industrial and research activities in the areas of Data and AI. Organised by BDVA in collaboration with DTU – Technical University of Denmark and SDU – University of Southern Denmark, this flagship event is the premier event of Europe’s data and AI industry-driven research and innovation community. The theme of EBDVF 2025, Empowering Europe’s Future with AI and Data, highlights Europe’s ambition to harness data and artificial intelligence. Data and AI are a key driver of economic growth, competitiveness and innovation, delivering tangible benefits such as better healthcare, cleaner and safer transport, new products and services and progress in sustainability and energy efficiency, which can reinforce Europe’s position in the global data economy.

The EBDVF programme covered burning topics within the European Data and AI ecosystem in over 40 sessions, touching on the present and future of Industrial AI in Europe. We found out how AI Factories and Gigafactories will revolutionise our continent, learning more about their value offer. Many different sessions were linked to the AI Continent Action plan and the European Data Union Strategy. EBDVF covered topics such as Generative AI and agents, interoperability and AI value creation, with sessions examining how these technologies can transform both European industry and the public sector. The forum highlighted how data spaces are becoming central to the European data and AI ecosystem.

You are kindly invited to download the EBDVF 2025 report HERE. 

EBDVF 2025 promoted initiatives and set the ground for growing collaborations and partnerships, through a close and powerful industry-research-policy collaboration with a focus on challenges and opportunities of Data and AI considering the technological, societal and economical aspects. To achieve those purposes, we gathered in Copenhagen high-level industry professionals, top business developers, researchers and policymakers from all over Europe and other regions of the world to support policy actions and industrial and research activities on the cutting edge of technological advancements.

BDVA is open to welcome new members within the European Data and AI community!

Learn more about our members and activities. You can contact us anytime at info@bdva.eu.

The post EBDVF 2025 report! appeared first on BDV Big Data Value Association.

Take a look at 1000 photos from EBDVF 2025, in our dedicated Flickr account!

The theme of this year’s EBDVF 2025, Empowering Europe’s Future with AI and Data, highlighted Europe’s ambition to harness data and artificial intelligence and showcased 180 speakers, all highly relevant actors of our ecosystem. Data and AI are a key driver of economic growth, competitiveness and innovation, delivering tangible benefits such as better healthcare, cleaner and safer transport, new products and services and progress in sustainability and energy efficiency, which can reinforce Europe’s position in the global data economy.

The EBDVF programme covered burning topics within the European Data and AI ecosystem in 8 plenary sessions and 35 parallel sessions, touching on the present and future of Industrial AI in Europe, we found out how AI Factories and Gigafactories will revolutionise our continent, learning more about their value offer. Many different sessions were linked to the AI Continent Action plan and the European Data Union.

EBDVF touched upon Generative AI and agents, interoperability and AI value creation, with sessions examining how these technologies can transform both European industry and the public sector. The forum also highlighted how data spaces are becoming central to the European data and AI ecosystem. We were able to find out the latest innovations in manufacturing, healthcare, energy, compliance, urban mobility, security and defence.

We want to thank our 53 partners and sponsors, who presented their innovations and services in 24 booths, placed throughout the exhibition space. A huge thank you to our EBDVF Platinum sponsors/partners Siemens, COSMOTE-TELEKOM, NEC Laboratories Europe and EGI Foundation!

The BDVA i-Space Ceremony was an important highlight of our event, closing Day 2 of EBDVF. The i-Space label is a quality standard that serves as a benchmark, supporting organisations in their growth and enabling them to achieve their ambitions of expanding their networks and increasing their impact. The entities that have obtained the i-Space label make up a community of 33 hubs across 22 countries in Europe, creating unique opportunities for collaboration and the development of synergies. Today, the i-Spaces community is a large European network of federated hubs promoting data innovation and AI experimentation, all based on secure data-sharing and computing infrastructures.

On the 13 November, during the i-Spaces ceremony, the Commissariat à l’energie atomique et aux énergies alternatives and poltextLAB were officially welcomed within the community by BDVA President Thomas Hahn and BDVA Vice-president Laure Le Bars. DIHGIGAL, already a BDVA i-Space, was granted a label of a new tier – the Platinum BDVA i-Space label, as a result of the progress that the organisation made, especially in relation to their participation in the European projects.

We will now start uploading the event presentations to the event website and will keep you informed once all the materials are available. So, stay tuned!

Meanwhile, we would kindly like to ask you to please complete the EBDVF 2026 survey, which was sent via email to all participants.

We want to thank you for joining our dynamic data and AI community in Copenhagen, we really hope that you have enjoyed our matchmaking and networking opportunities and last, but not least, that you had fun!

We look forward to welcoming you to EBDVF 2026 next year in Galway, Ireland, from 30 September – 1 October❗ Until then, don’t forget to check all of the EBDVF 2026 photos❗

The post EBDVF 2025 ended, photos available! appeared first on BDV Big Data Value Association.

Read the full BDVA i-Spaces 2025 Press Release here:

DIHGIGAL is an EDIH based in Galicia – one of the least digitalised regions of Spain. In this challenging environment, DIHGIGAL supports the local companies with access to infrastructure and training, to help the innovation, especially in the sector of manufacturing.

Commissariat à l’energie atomique et aux énergies alternatives is a French public government-funded research organisation in the areas of energy, defence and security, information technologies and health technologies. CEA-List, one of three institutes of CEA, runs an open innovation platform that helps partners develop their products in a quick and efficient way.

poltextLAB is a research lab based at the ELTE Centre for Social Sciences, Budapest, focussing on applications of text mining and Artificial Intelligence (AI) to social science research problems.

About the BDVA i-Spaces label

The i-Space label is a quality standard that serves as a benchmark, supporting organisations in their growth and enabling them to achieve their ambitions of expanding their networks and increasing their impact. The entities that have obtained the i-Space label make up a community of 33 hubs across 22 countries in Europe, creating unique opportunities for collaboration and the development of synergies. Today, the i-Spaces community is a large European network of federated hubs promoting data innovation and AI experimentation, all based on secure data-sharing and computing infrastructures. By joining forces, these organisations have formed a pan-European super-core, combining computing power, ethical frameworks, business models, and more, resulting in a federated catalogue that accelerates the progress and adoption of data-driven innovation and AI technologies across Europe.

The evaluation process conducted by BDVA emphasises excellence in the following domains: infrastructure, services, projects, ecosystem/impact, business/sustainability strategy, federation capabilities and ethics.

For further inquiries, please contact: operations@bdva.eu and communications@bdva.eu.

The post BDVA i-Spaces: the backbone of the European Innovation ecosystem appeared first on BDV Big Data Value Association.

The post Get ready for 2026: Data Week and EBDVF! appeared first on BDV Big Data Value Association.

Officially launched on June 19th, 2025, the Forum is connecting Member States, academia, industry, NGO, policy makers and civil society to turn research into actionable solutions and drive systemic change.

Those solutions were the key topics of discussions of the Women in Digital Summit, hosted in Brussels on 13th and 14th November, 2025 and part of the Digital Skills EU Days 2025. The Summit brought together leaders from industry, government and education to share insights and best practices aimed at closing the gender gap in digital roles both in education and career.

The event was a great learning occasion as it saw the official launch of the Women in Digital Index & Scoreboard, aimed at assessing with data the situation of women in digital across the different EU countries and beyond.

To inspire the change, the event hosted fireside chats with women in leadership positions, who can play as role models for future careers and drive the systemic change for empowering women in the ICT sector. Also, the Summit hosted technical yet practical sessions with policy makers who provided an overview of key actions to boost the number of women in digital in their respective EU Member States.

Be part of the change!

The Forum envisions a Europe where digital innovations is inclusive, diversity is valued, and ICT careers offer opportunities for all, especially women and future generations. It serves as a primary platform for shaping inclusive policies and strategies.

The Forum is composed by Thematic Working Groups, which are unique spaces where experts, innovators, and changemakers collaborate to shape a more inclusive digital future. You can act now by joining the Forum or apply to be part of the experts in the latest groups launched: Thematic Working Groups 3 – Reprogramming Skills: VET as a Catalyst for Women’s Digital Transitions (apply here) and Thematic Working Group 4 – Intersectional Approaches (apply here) (registrations open until November 26, 2025 at 18:00 CET).

The post Women in Digital Summit – A digital future for everyone appeared first on BDV Big Data Value Association.

The design of data architectures has undergone a remarkable transformation in recent years. What was once a relatively standardised ETL (extract, transform, load) process linked to a central data warehouse has evolved into a diverse ecosystem of complex frameworks, including data lakehouses, data meshes, data fabrics, data virtualisation and cloud-native models, often deployed in combination.

These modern approaches have emerged to overcome the limitations of traditional systems, particularly when dealing with the challenges of today’s data landscape: vast data volumes, unstructured and multimodal formats, the growing need for real-time processing and demands for scalability and flexibility.

Beyond these technical evolutions, the increasing need to share data across organisations, sectors and borders – to fully unlock its value – has spurred the rise of data spaces, which modern architectures must now be designed to support and connect with. At the same time, the primary application of data is shifting from traditional analytics towards advanced artificial intelligence (AI) workflows, bringing a new set of requirements for data management and infrastructure design.

The BDVA workshop “Evolving data architectures for distributed, intensive, AI-driven applications” (as part of AG71)

Date: 22 October, from 10:00 – 13:00 CEST 

Full agenda :

Objectives of the Session

• Review the current landscape of big data architectures, from established models to cutting-edge approaches.
• Identify and analyse new trends shaping the design of modern data ecosystems.
• Discuss challenges and requirements these architectures must meet, particularly in relation to:

  • Managing massive, unstructured and multimodal data.

  • Supporting real-time and AI-driven workflows.

  • Enabling cross-organisation and cross-sector data sharing through data spaces.

  • Addressing broader issues such as interoperability, governance, standards, security and trust.

• Exchange insights and experiences among BDVA members to better understand adoption pathways, practical barriers and opportunities for collaboration.

This workshop fostered dialogue and collaboration among experts and stakeholders to ensure that Europe’s data architectures remain at the forefront of innovation, supporting trustworthy, interoperable and AI-ready data ecosystems.

The post BDVA workshop on new data architectures appeared first on BDV Big Data Value Association.

Data is one of Europe’s most valuable economic assets, central to the ambitions of the European Data Union strategy. The European Data Union strategy is designed to strengthen data sovereignty, foster trust and ensure a fair distribution of the value created by data, which are key ingredients to scaling up AI effectively across the EU.

In this context, the European Data Spaces Awards have been launched with the objective of promoting the best-in-class European data sharing initiatives. The awards will put the spotlight on the achievements of leading initiatives that exemplify excellence in data sharing, providing visibility and guidance for others while encouraging a stronger and improved data community. Organised by the Data Spaces Support Centre (DSSC) in collaboration with the European Commission, the awards are closely tied to the Maturity Model for Common European Data Spaces, reinforcing shared principles and long-term goals.

The 2025 edition will feature two categories, offering applicants from across the ecosystem the chance to showcase their impact:

Category 1: Excellence in end-user engagement and financial sustainability

This category recognises data spaces that demonstrate strong user focus and a viable long-term financial model. Download the application form here.

Category 2: Most innovative emerging data space

This category celebrates promising new initiatives that bring fresh ideas and impactful innovation to the data space ecosystem.

Key dates for applicants include:

• Application period: 23 September – 7 November 2025
• Nominee announcement: 17 December 2025
• Awards ceremony: 10 February 2026, during the Data Spaces Symposium 2026 (DSS 2026)

The post European Data Spaces Awards 2025 launched! Apply now! appeared first on BDV Big Data Value Association.

Organised by BDVA, Data Week 2025 centered its focus on the fundamental elements of Data Value creation. And as artificial intelligence (AI) serves as a pivotal tool in unlocking data value through various means, this is why our event`s theme is “Odyssey of AI: Navigating the Data Seas”. Creating value from data also requires viewing it from an ecosystem perspective and fostering collaboration among multiple stakeholders, which lays the groundwork needed for research excellence, required to be rapidly put into action for competitiveness and societal benefit.

This year, Data Week was a 2-day physical event that took place in Athens, Greece from 27-28 May. The event was organised by the Big Data Value Association, hosted by COSMOTE TELEKOM, in collaboration with the following BDVA members: Athens Technology Center S.A. (ATC), Institute of Communication and Computer Systems (ICCS), CORE Innovation Center, Institute of Informatics and Telecommunications – National Centre for Scientific Research “Demokritos”, FORTH and Neuropublic.

BDVA has partnered with the International Manufacturing-X for Data Week 2025, which brought our two communities together! One day prior to our event, on 26 May (Monday), an invitation-only workshop of International Manufacturing-X took place at the same venue location, the OTE Academy.

The post Data Week 2025 report appeared first on BDV Big Data Value Association.

The post EBDVF 2025 Sponsorship benefits & Early Bird registration appeared first on BDV Big Data Value Association.