European Commission's Data Strategy mentions benefits of CM&S and digital twins

The European strategy for data aims at creating a single market for data that will ensure Europe's global competitiveness and data sovereignty.

The European Commission has put together a four-pillar strategy, which entails several actions hat will be taken by the Commission during the next three years:      

1. Pillar A - A cross-sectoral governance framework for data access and use:

• Propose a legislative framework for the governance of common European data spaces (Q4 - 2020);
• Adopt and implement act on high-value datasets (Q-2021);
• Propose a Data Act (2021);
• Conduct an analysis of the importance of data in the digital economy and review of the existing policy framework in the context of the Digital Services Act package (Q4 – 2020)

2. Pillar B - Enablers: Investments in data and strengthening Europe's capabilities and  infrastructures for hosting, processing and using data, interoperability:

• Invest in a high Impact project on European data space. The Commission aims at investing 2 billion euro (2022);
• Sign Memoranda of Understanding with Member States on cloud federation (Q3 - 2023);
• Launch a European cloud services marketplace and integrating the full stack of cloud services offering (Q4 - 2022);
•  Create an EU self-regulatory cloud rulebook (Q2 - 2022).

3. Pillar C - Competences: Empowering individuals, investing in skills in SMEs:

• Enhance the portability right for individuals (Article 20 GDPR) to give Eu citizens more control over who can access and use machine-generated data.

4. Pillar D - Common European data spaces in strategic sectors and domains of public interest:

• The Commission will support the establishment of nine common European data space related to industry, Green Deal, mobility, health, finance, energy, agriculture public administration and European skills.

It is important to note that the European Commission refers several times to computer modelling and simulation (CM&S) and digital twins. The Commission recognises the opportunity that digital twins can bring for healthcare and how data could improve personalised medicine.

The Commission Data Strategy seems to be very ambitious and foresees the creation of European Data Spaces and federated cloud infrastructures with a total funding of 4-6 billion euros. The Data platforms will aim to offer access to a large diversity of cloud services for data storage but also applications ranging from artificial intelligence to simulation, modelling, digital twins and high performances computing (HPC) resources.

Following the publication of the European Data Strategy, the Commission launched a public online consultation on the European strategy for data. This is an opportunity to express your concerns and doubts and give guidance to the Commission.

The VPHi is preparing a response together with its industry partner under the umbrella of the Avicenna Alliance. If you are a VPHi member and would like contribute, please contact the VPHi manager (manager@vph-institute.org)