Press release
Munich, March 31, 2025 – The Gaia-X Hub Germany has launched a free online campus on the data economy. Starting on 31 March 2025, interested parties can learn the basics of the data economy as well as the concepts of data spaces and data ecosystems. The online courses are available free of charge and without registration at https://gaia-x-hub.de/en/campus-en/ in English and German. The campus is aimed at interested parties from politics, administration, science, and business who want to familiarize themselves with the topic without in-depth IT knowledge.
“Our readers’ time is short. That’s why the Campus offers a quick, easy-to-understand and well founded overview of the data economy,” explains Jan Fischer, Project Manager of the Gaia-X Hub Germany. “We have deliberately avoided complicated technical terms and instead rely on clear language and illustrative examples,” says Fischer.
Easy-to-understand introduction to creating value from data
Unlike comparable offerings, the Campus does not rely on video courses with quiz questions, but on multimedia-enriched texts. “Our experience shows that texts are an effective way for a specialist audience to quickly familiarize themselves with a complex topic,” says Fischer. “Users can read our lessons directly on our website, follow them on LinkedIn or download them as a PDF.”
The campus starts with three lessons as an introduction to the data economy.
1. Lesson 1 explains the European data dilemma and Europe’s digital backwardness.
2. Lesson 2 presents data spaces as Europe’s answer to the data age and shows how companies can use them to exchange data confidently and securely.
3. Readers can find out why a European network of interoperable data spaces is needed in Lesson 3.
Content cooperations
The German Gaia-X Hub is cooperating with other organizations in the data community on this educational offer. “Our colleagues from the newly founded Swiss hub want to translate the campus courses into their national languages,” explains Fischer. Other cooperation partners for the launch are the Gaia-X umbrella organization in Brussels, the Gaia-X funding project MERLOT and the Institute for Applied Systems Technology (AST) at Fraunhofer IOSB.
Data economy as the key to Europe’s future
The campus comes at a crucial time. Current studies show that 80 percent of industrial data in Europe remains unused. At the same time, the USA, and China alone account for 90 percent of market capitalization in digital platforms and 94 percent of investor capital for AI start-ups. The path to a sovereign European data economy lies in the secure exchange and shared use of data. “Progress and growth are increasingly dependent on our ability to exchange and share data,” emphasizes Fischer. “The answers that organizations find to this challenge will have a significant impact on their success in the coming years.”
About the Gaia-X Hub Germany
Since its foundation in 2020, the Gaia-X Hub Germany has been the central point of contact for anyone interested in exchanging data in open data ecosystems. Its aim is to support the development of an international data economy that is in line with European values and economic structures. The Gaia-X Hub promotes the development and use of Gaia-X in Germany. As a networking platform, the Hub brings together representatives from science, business, politics and society to exchange experiences, gain insights and jointly put them into practice. In addition to the German Gaia-X Hub, there are currently fourteen other national hubs within the EU and three outside Europe.
For further information please contact:
Gaia-X Hub Germany
c/o acatech – German Academy of Science and Engineering
Karolinenplatz 4
80333 Munich
Thomas Sprenger
Communications Officer Gaia-X Hub Germany
Phone: +49 1520 98 343 98
E-Mail: gaia-x-presse@acatech.de
