Begoña Villacís, executive director of SpainDC, reiterates that digitalization and AI require local infrastructure. Spain offers international connectivity, low latency and competitive renewables. She calls for network reinforcement, administrative agility and regulatory security to attract investment and qualified employment.

P. A lot of people hear about data centers but don't know what they are. How would you explain it to someone on the street?

R. Data centers are the buildings where the Internet lives, the cloud... They are the ones that make our modern life possible, that make everything we use every day work: WhatsApp, Bizum, streaming series, digital medical records or electronic administration. The Internet is physical and its backbone is data centers. Without them, none of it would work. Digitalization would not be possible

Q. Why does Spain have a unique opportunity to lead this industry?

R. We have three unique advantages: international connectivity (we are a natural bridge to Europe, Latin America and North Africa), world leadership in renewable energies and well-connected industrial land. This positions us to lead the digital hub of southern Europe and attract high value-added investments.

Q. Who benefits from this beyond the technology sector?

R. To the entire economy and, by extension, to society as a whole. We are an enabling and essential infrastructure. Healthcare, banking, industry, education, public administrations... Our analysis identifies more than 30 critical use cases -such as robotic surgery or citizen data management- that require infrastructure in Spanish territory due to latency, resilience and data sovereignty. This is also qualified employment, talent attraction and value chain for SMEs and universities.

P. You hear that data centers are big spenders, what would you say to those who see that as a negative?

R. Digitalization is not a dilemma, it is not whether it will take place or not, if there is a question it is how it is going to be. Our goal is to do it responsibly, but digitalization already exists and is growing; the question is whether Spain hosts that activity (with employment, investment and data control) or outsources it. Moreover, the sector is one of the most measured and efficient and improves its efficiency indicators every year.

Q. What are you worried about right now in order not to miss the train?

R. The electricity grid is the bottleneck: 83.4% of the distribution network is at the limit. If we do not strengthen transmission and distribution with a 2030-2035 vision, Spain could miss out on strategic investments. We also need legal certainty and administrative agility in permits and access to energy.

Q. What are your specific requests to the administrations?

R. Three things: advance electricity planning; agility and regulatory homogeneity in licensing and network access, and a sustainability framework that is proportionate and aligned with Europe, because we support the reporting of energy and environmental KPIs, but without over-transpositions that reduce Spain's competitiveness compared to other EU countries.

Q. What role does artificial intelligence play here?

R. AI does not exist without data centers: it is trained and served from them, and it also helps us to be more efficient with predictive maintenance and energy optimization. Spain has the opportunity to become a computing platform for AI if we accelerate the right infrastructure.

AI does not exist without data centers: training and inference live in them. Our horizon is clear and hopefully Spain will be the computing platform for European AI. We certainly have the opportunity, but to achieve this we need low-latency local computing capacity, reinforced and predictable power grids, renewable PPAs... In addition, AI itself helps us to be more efficient with predictive maintenance and energy optimization. AI and data centers are a win-win tandem.

Q. What will SpainDC bring to Data Center World Madrid?

R. Data Center World is the meeting point where the sector lands real solutions: operators, manufacturers and experts share technology and learnings that accelerate the digitization of the country. We are participating by providing coverage and with a panel, Energy for the digital economy: how to guarantee the supply that digitalization needs, where we will talk about innovation to better consume each megawatt, how data centers facilitate the integration of renewables with PPAs and demand flexibility... Our goal is clear: that energy is an enabler of the cloud and AI, and that Spain gains competitiveness with an efficient, reliable and sustainable digital infrastructure.