18 November, 2020

ETNO joins GAIA-X Association, calls for EU leadership in the data economy

ETNO joins GAIA-X Association, calls for EU leadership in the data economy

Brussels, 18 November 2020 – ETNO, the Association representing Europe’s leading telecom companies, is proud to announce that it has become a member of GAIA-X, the project to foster open and transparent European data infrastructure.

Telecoms has been one of the founding sectors of the GAIA-X Association, which also includes several ETNO members from different European countries.

As the European Commission works to support a thriving European data economy, telecom companies can be the bridge between the governance framework of future European data spaces and the underlying federated cloud infrastructures – which are the two main pillars of the EU Data Strategy.

In this context, ETNO will contribute to the work of GAIA-X by promoting policies for a secure and interoperable framework for data sharing in Europe. ETNO is an advocate of EU policies that, by building on European values, push for European industrial leadership and innovation in the global data economy. This will be crucial to give more choice to European businesses and citizens when it comes to digital services, including cloud and data services.

Lise Fuhr, ETNO Director General, said: “The open, transparent and ecosystem-oriented approach of the GAIA-X project has the potential to give a new role to the EU in the global data economy. We must strive for leadership, so that we can inject more European choice into digital markets”.