On 17 June 2025, ELIXIR held the fifth ELIXIR Bioinformatics Industry Forum (EBIF) in London, UK. This year’s EBIF brought together 60 bioinformaticians from academia and industry to discuss challenges in federated life science data analysis.
The first session focused on publicly-funded initiatives in federated data analytics. Speakers from various initiatives and EU projects shared their experiences in enabling federated analysis with industry, across Trusted Research Environments (TREs) and within the European AI Factories ecosystem. Strengthening interoperability between different infrastructures and TREs is a challenging but critical part of fostering collaboration in federated data analysis.
In the second session, speakers from industry emphasised the importance of collaboration, not only with academia but also other industry partners. The panel discussion focused on fostering collaborations in federated data analytics. The panellists shared ideas of cross-border collaboration and the benefits of forming partnerships beyond Europe. Regarding TREs, the panellists agreed that linking existing initiatives and projects, such as European Health Data Space, EOSC-ENTRUST and TEHDAS, would help identify current challenges and needs.
The event concluded with a successful roundtable discussion session covering a range of topics on federated data analysis, proposed by researchers from industry and academia. Topics included:
- How federated analysis would be feasible in EHDS cross-border context
- Leveraging AI in federated genomics: Opportunities and challenges ahead
- Enabling secure, decentralised and scalable data ecosystems through tokenisation
- Initial steps in federated analysis on sensitive data and developing the appropriate ecosystem nationally
- How existing initiatives and solutions enable federated collaboration and data sharing across multiple research environments
For further information on ELIXIR industry activities, visit our Innovation and industry webpage and sign up for our Industry newsletter to find out about future ELIXIR events and activities. Please contact Industry Officer, Despoina Sousoni (despoina.sousoni@elixir-europe.org), if you have any specific questions.