As our digital world becomes increasingly interconnected, designing for sovereignty and trust is essential. That’s why the Eclipse Dataspace (EDWG) and Open Regulatory Compliance (ORC) Working Groups are heading to the Global Digital Collaboration Conference to host a series of sessions under the theme “Sovereign by Design.”
Running from 1–2 July 2025, the conference gathers leading minds shaping the global collaboration landscape. These sessions are not only timely, they are strategic. As the Eclipse Dataspace Working Group advances the development of open source components and specifications for data sharing at scale, our community is increasingly focused on ensuring that such architectures are trustworthy, interoperable, and regulation-ready from the start.
Why “Sovereign by Design”?
The Eclipse Dataspace Working Group champions open, vendor-neutral dataspaces that enable secure, sovereign data sharing across ecosystems. The ORC Working Group empowers open source communities and stakeholders to meet new regulatory requirements, such as the EU Cyber Resilience Act (CRA), while preserving the integrity of the open source development model.
The term “digital sovereignty” has gained significant traction in recent years, particularly in the context of European data strategy. But beyond the geopolitical narrative, digital sovereignty is fundamentally about control, trust, and interoperability, both for individuals and organisations. For dataspaces, sovereignty by design means embedding these principles directly into the architecture: using open standards, enforcing data usage policies, ensuring verifiability, and enabling compliance with regulations like the Data Act and the Cyber Resilience Act (CRA).
Together, these efforts reflect a shared vision: sovereignty is not a consequence, but a design principle. Across three sessions, our speakers will explore how credentials, compliance, and community driven frameworks come together to build trust into the fabric of digital ecosystems.
Session Line-Up
Sovereign by Design: Trust Frameworks
Date & Time: 2 July, 09:40–10:40 CEST
Join us as we explore how credentials are used as a cornerstone of Trust Frameworks for dataspaces and data exchange activities. In this session, key players in the field will present their approaches to achieving trust in such a demanding ecosystem.
The Trust Frameworks session features three complementary perspectives:
- Christoph Strnadl (Gaia-X) will present the Gaia-X Trust Framework, a cornerstone of federated digital infrastructure in Europe, built to ensure that participants in a dataspace can trust each other and the data they exchange.
- Rajiv Rajani (iShare) will highlight how iShare enables “your data, your rules” through their trust framework, making it possible to share sensitive data across organizations while preserving control.
- Etan Bernstein (Velocity Network Foundation) will provide a global angle, illustrating how self-sovereign identity and verifiable credentials are already powering workforce and credentialing applications at scale.
A 15-minute Q&A will follow the presentations.
Sovereign by Design: Panel Discussion
Date & Time: 2 July, 10:50 - 11:50 CEST
Following the trust frameworks session, this panel explores questions around sovereignty in digital systems. How do we create trust in digital ecosystems? Why are credentials critical to achieving this? How can we navigate the different regulatory and geographical challenges?
Panelists will discuss the real world gaps, opportunities, and convergence potential across ecosystems. We aim to spark alignment between community driven efforts like the EDWG, frameworks like Gaia-X and iShare, and the technical building blocks around credentials.
Moderator:
- Javier Valiño, Dataspaces Program Manager, Eclipse Foundation
Panelists:
- Christoph Strnadl, CTO, Gaia-X
- Rajiv Rajani, CTO, iShare
- Etan Bernstein, Co-Founder, Velocity Network Foundation
This interactive discussion includes 15 minutes of audience Q&A.
Sovereign by Design: Regulatory Compliance and the Cyber Resilience Act
Date & Time: 2 July, 12:00 - 13:00 CEST
This session brings the focus to regulation, specifically the Cyber Resilience Act, and how open source stakeholders can prepare. With insights from open source leaders and industry experts, it examines both the risks and the paths forward for CRA compliance.
In this session:
- Juan Rico, Senior Manager for ORC, will present how we are building specifications achieving the complicated goal of translating the CRA into actionable requirements.
- Daniel Thompson-Yvetot (CrabNebula) will share insights on “manufacturing European software”, a call to rethink how we produce software with sovereignty, auditability, and resilience in mind.
- Roman Zhukov (Red Hat) will walk us through how a global open source company is preparing for CRA compliance, offering practical guidance relevant to the entire software ecosystem.
A Q&A session will conclude the discussion.
Explore the full agenda: Conference Schedule – July 2
Join Us in Geneva
These sessions reflect the Eclipse Foundation’s commitment to building open, sovereign, and secure digital infrastructure. Whether you’re in policy, open source, industry, or academia, you won’t want to miss these thought-provoking discussions.
🔗 Register now to secure your spot and be part of the conversation shaping tomorrow’s trusted digital landscape.
