In the ever-evolving tech industry, diverse perspectives drive innovation and change. In this edition of “Her Voice in Tech: 3 Questions with…”, we speak with Dominique Epardeau, General Secretary – International Affairs at EONA-X, who has played a key role in fostering data sharing and innovation in the mobility, tourism, and logistics sectors. From supporting the emergence of EONA-X to advocating for more women in tech, she shares her journey, challenges, and vision for a more inclusive and competitive digital future.
- As a woman in tech, how have you leveraged your voice to drive change in your field?
I actively supported the emergence of the EONA-X Mobility, Tourism and Logistics dataspace, at first by helping to finance it through the France 2030 investment in the future, but above all through the deployment of a first operational use case during Olympic games. It was not so easy to convince the participants to share information and to use such an innovative data exchange system. I don’t have a technical background as such, but I was supported by a great team, and above all by a fierce need to understand and provide real value to operational users. The most important, in my view, was to be able to ask good basic questions to ensure that things progress in the expected direction. With my financial background but also common sense, I feel that women bring their own more global views than most male experts in IT.
- What change would you like to see in the tech industry that will empower future generations of women?
I believe that women should do more tech studies, but I regret not having done it personally. Tech and innovation are important drivers of the business and a significant source of value-added services. Being able to assess the key challenges and opportunities offered by the new technologies allows us to remain among the leading players. Women must not stay aside from that. This is not rocket science!
- What problem in your industry do you hope Gaia-X will solve in the next 5 years?
I hope that Gaia-X will quickly provide pragmatic and user-friendly solutions to incentivise economic players to share data at a very large scale. Doing it in a real sovereign manner and creating either new added value services or cost-efficient and smart processes in Europe is also very important in the actual world competition. We shouldn’t be naïve. Other players do not do it for good, and the time will come when prices will rise a lot if we don’t master this technology on our own. We should also help to empower European businesses, particularly SMEs. Data exchange is only a layer to leads to AI agents and in EONA-X we work on the two levels.