At AI WEEK 2026, the IPCEI-CIS project Villanova will highlight how the 8ra Initiative contributes to Europe’s digital sovereignty and to the development of a sovereign, secure and interoperable cloud-edge infrastructure.
Event details
Title: AI WEEK 2026
Date: 19 to 20 May 2026
Location: Milan, Italy | Fiera Milano Rho
More information and registration: click here
Taking place on 19-20 May 2026 at Fiera Milano Rho in Milan, AI WEEK brings together companies, innovators and technology experts to explore the role of artificial intelligence in business, industry and society.
European AI needs sovereign digital infrastructure
Villanova will be present in Hall 13/15 at the Innovation Hub CDO stand. The team will address the growing importance of European digital sovereignty in a cloud market still strongly shaped by non-European providers.
From an 8ra perspective, this connection is central. Europe’s ability to develop, deploy and scale trustworthy AI does not depend on models and applications alone. It also requires secure, interoperable and sovereign infrastructure that enables data processing across cloud and edge environments.
Through the 8ra Initiative, European partners are working to build a federated Multi-Provider Cloud-Edge Continuum that supports openness, interoperability, resilience and reduced technological dependency.
Villanova as part of the 8ra ecosystem
As part of the IPCEI-CIS, Villanova focuses on multimodal generative AI models tailored to European languages and regional needs. The project addresses key European priorities such as linguistic diversity, privacy, digital inclusivity and access to advanced AI technologies.
By combining generative AI with cloud-edge computing, Villanova contributes to the broader 8ra objective of enabling intelligent, secure and scalable digital services across Europe. Its work includes AI-driven applications and an open-source framework designed to support collaboration between human operators and AI systems.
Key moments at AI WEEK
19 May 2026 | 16:00
“8ra: la svolta della sovranità digitale europea”
Andrea Podda, Chief Innovation & Growth, and Luca La Brocca, R&I Business Development Manager, will speak at the Innovation Hub of Compagnia delle Opere.
20 May 2026 | 10:45
Villanova will also contribute to the main stage programme together with Prof. Emanuele Frontoni, Scientific Director of the Villanova project.
Connecting AI innovation with Europe’s cloud-edge future
Villanova’s presence at AI WEEK 2026 shows how the IPCEI-CIS projects contribute to the 8ra Initiative’s wider mission: strengthening Europe’s capacity to build and deploy digital services on sovereign, interoperable and trusted infrastructure.
By bringing 8ra into the discussion at AI WEEK, Villanova helps connect the debate on artificial intelligence with the infrastructure needed to make European AI innovation scalable, secure and sustainable.