Leading IT infrastructure and services company NTT DATA, headquartered in Japan, plays a key role in Luxembourg’s efforts to build dataspaces for secure and compliant data exchange.
Lena Mårtensson
NTT DATA came to Luxembourg in 2010 and today, in addition to serving the local market, it is running innovation projects on the broader European scene. Examples of high-profile initiatives include the race management system built for the Isle of Man TT races, and the renowned AVATAR project aimed at building a complete digital twin of an airplane. “We make Luxembourg shine as an innovation hub,” emphasises Marketing Director Marta Duponselle.
A common denominator of these and other projects is that they are fully based on cloud native service design and can run in private and public cloud environments. “Unstructured data is only valuable when you are able to transform it into meaningful information, notably by using large language modules to leverage artificial intelligence,” says Michael Mossal, Senior Digital Transformation Director at NTT DATA Luxembourg. “A dedicated ecosystem – a data space – is then the most suitable solution for defining how to store the transformed, use-case specific and structured data in a way that is compliant with data protection legislation.”
When the COVID-19 pandemic hit in 2020, Luxembourg decided to put in place a voluntary large-scale testing of the entire population and cross-border workers, aimed at detecting positive cases early. Laboratoires Réunis, a private laboratory for medical analyses, took the lead and contacted NTT to develop the IT solution needed.
“We had six weeks to deploy a cloud native application, connecting a whole range of different systems including healthcare processes and the repository of citizen data, and make it able to send the test results to citizens’ mobiles,” Mr Mossal recalls. “We pointed out that this could only be done through an innovative, cloud-native solution, and that there was no regulation available in Luxembourg supporting us for doing this in the public cloud. Due to the urgency of the situation, we still went ahead, with the clear commitment to bring in experts to cope with the local regulation as soon as the first version was out. Human lives were at stake!”
We pointed out that this could only be done through an innovative, cloud-native solution.
Michael Mossal, NTT DATA Luxembourg
The system developed was a huge success. For NTT DATA, it opened the door for further work in the health sector. After supporting the development of a digital platform and data strategy for Luxembourg hospital Hôpitaux Robert Schuman (HRS), the company and HRS developed two use cases for the government on how to improve heart disease and stroke care through 5G-transmitted data. “As no real patient data was required in this research project, we could leverage public cloud services. After successfully delivering another award-winning project, several doctors wanted to see our system in production, but once again there was no regulation allowing us to handle real health data in a similar production environment.”
This encouraged NTT DATA to join forces with the HRS, the Luxembourg Institute of Health, the University of Luxembourg, Agence eSanté, the Luxembourg National Data Service (LNDS) and Luxinnovation to develop a pioneering federated dataspace for secure and compliant health data exchange while fully adhering to EU regulations. “The consortium is building a federated dataspace where national data related to our next two use cases, diabetes and oncology, will be stored and exchanged. Similarly to other European countries, the project defines, for the first time, how health data will be made available for primary and secondary use in the future,” explains Mr Mossal. “If researchers want to use this data for research purposes, for example, the LNDS can grant them access for secondary use in a way that fully respects data privacy and local regulations. We are taking local regulations into account, but are also fully aligned with the European Health Data Space (EHDS) to facilitate cross-border data exchange.”
Working from Luxembourg is unique – the country is rarely the first mover, but can sometimes leapfrog to come up with truly innovative ideas.
Michael Mossal, NTT DATA Luxembourg
The Dataspace4Health project represents a significant step forward in the digital transformation of Luxembourg’s healthcare ecosystem. However, the outlook is broader than just health. “The Ministry of the Economy has foreseen this project as a foundation that can be leveraged for other verticals. Further dataspaces for mobility, energy and more can make use of the same concept and rules,” Mr Mossal underlines.
While the focus is primarily European, NTT DATA Luxembourg is also working with NTT DATA in Japan and the University of Tokyo on the secure and regulated health data exchange between Luxembourg and Japan. “We are in early stages, but Japan and Europe have very similar approaches when it comes to data interoperability and exchange. Dataspaces in both countries have the same underlying foundation, which enables us to work together and exchange data fully in line with European regulations,” comments Mr Mossal. “Working from Luxembourg is unique – the country is rarely the first mover, but as it has short decision processes, a great ecosystem, leading research institutes and a forward-looking government, it is very agile and can sometimes leapfrog to come up with truly innovative ideas.”
Photo credits: Luxinnovation/Jessica Theis
