Catalonia aims to make the definitive leap into the market in the quantum industry. After years focused on "generating knowledge," in the words of the Secretary of Digital Policies of the Generalitat, Maria Galindo, the country is experiencing a moment of "quantum effervescence" that allows it to aspire to compete with international powers. According to a sectoral report prepared by Acció, the agency for business growth of the Department of Business and Labour, this industry invoiced 91.4 million euros in 2024 – the last year with definitive data; a limited figure, but one that the sector celebrates within the framework of still incipient deep technology.

The CEO of Google DeepMind and Nobel laureate in Chemistry, Demis Hassabis, has warned that artificial general intelligence (AGI) could arrive "in three or four years," urging "urgent measures" to ensure this technology is developed safely.

Television viewers are accustomed to seeing the familiar bug in a corner of the screen, the logo that reminds us at all times which channel we are watching. In mobile telephony, there is an equivalent: the Service Provider Name (SPN), the text that indicates which network the terminal is connected to and that appears in the top status bar, alongside indicators such as coverage or battery level.

Justice has declared null Leitat's employment regulation file (ERO), approved in 2024 and which affected 115 workers. The social court of Terrassa has ruled in favor of the 59 former employees who sued the company for formal defects in the collective dismissal. Furthermore, the judge considers it proven that the company "failed to negotiate in good faith" with the staff.

Would you like to become a novicus, an apprentice gladiator in the amphitheater of Tarraco 2,000 years ago, for a few minutes? You will do so guided by Marcus Valerius Mesala, editor muneris of Tarraco, who will explain the secrets of this space, you will be able to witness a gladiator fight and experience a fight against exotic animals from the arena itself.

The technology industry has become one of the central pillars of the Catalan economy. The economic figures of the ICT sector (information and communication technologies) have grown non-stop in the last decade, according to the 18 editions of the annual barometer published by the Technological Circle of Catalonia. The latest edition records an unprecedented business record: in 2025, technology companies in the Principality exceeded 30.6 billion euros in revenue. This is an increase of 13% compared to 2024, when the previous ceiling was also broken with more than 28 billion euros in income. Last year's total is equivalent to 9.1% of the country's gross domestic product (GDP), half a point more than the previous year.

Whatever your age, you who are reading this article know that technology is moving faster than human capacity to adapt to a new perception of reality. We have become a kind of overwhelmed jugglers or tightrope walkers traversing a cable far above our heads. I don't know if we have always been surpassed by technology throughout history; I suspect so, but never with such great acceleration, on so many fronts at once, and with such extensive shared knowledge of the metamorphosis we are immersed in as a society.

Europe continues to accelerate to finance its still scarce technological champions. The European Investment Bank, the Eurogroup and institutional investors from various member countries have joined forces to open a new chapter in the European Tech Champions Initiative (ETCI), a program to articulate capital that reaches the venture investment vehicles of the Twenty-seven to finance start-ups ("start-ups)and scalable (scale-ups) with more potential on the continent. The EIB has announced a second installment of the initiative, with the aim of attracting 15 billion euros to fuel European innovation.

This Friday marks 64 years since NASA put the Telstar 1, the first commercial telecommunications satellite, into orbit. Currently, 10,413 Starlink satellites, Elon Musk's company, fly over our heads. In contrast, the European Union, which has been talking about strategic autonomy in telecommunications for years, has not yet launched any from its flagship project. The difference explains where we are in 2026 in satellite connectivity.

China's decision to restrict the export of rare earths, permanent magnets, and other critical minerals to Japan has turned an industrial dependency known for years into a top-tier problem for the Japanese economy. These materials are indispensable for manufacturing semiconductors, electronic components, batteries, electric motors, or defense systems, so any interruption in their supply threatens some of the most competitive sectors of Japanese industry.

The Catalan aerospace industry has consolidated among "the most dynamic in southern Europe". This is confirmed by a report prepared by Acció, the agency for business growth of the Generalitat, which raises the sector's turnover in 2024 – the last year with available data – to 237 million euros. According to the study, presented this Wednesday at La Llotja de Mar, the number of space companies in the Principality has tripled since 2019, to 83. In total, the Catalan space industry employed around 1,822 people at the end of 2024. The strength of this technological segment underpins Barcelona's bid to host the International Astronautical Congress (IAC) in 2029, the world's most important fair for orbital activities.

Currently, the European Union (EU) is moving towards so-called strategic autonomy, which means doing everything possible to be less dependent on third parties, especially the United States and China. The club of twenty-seven is promoting this in all areas. The COVID pandemic taught us that leaving the production of items ranging from masks to hand sanitizers to prevent infections in the hands of other countries or trading blocs poses a very high risk, both for access to products and for the prices that must be paid in cases of urgent need. Geopolitical crises also cause disruptions in supply chains when there is a high dependence on materials and products from certain countries. Europe has been able to verify this with the closure of the Strait of Hormuz.

The Generalitat activates the creation of a "sovereign public cloud" in Catalonia to strengthen Catalan digital autonomy. The executive of Salvador Illa has opened the tender for the contract this Tuesday, with an estimated total value of up to 481 million euros during the first eight years, although the objective is to "maintain it once this period has passed". The new infrastructure will allow hosting 40% of the Catalan administration's digital services and data to "comply with the highest level of European sovereignty achievable today". According to the Government's forecasts, the service will come into operation during the second half of 2027 and will be fully operational during the third quarter of next year. The Minister of the Presidency, Albert Dalmau, has highlighted the capacity of the new Catalan cloud to "protect and store" citizens' data and public services.

The consortium behind the project for Móra la Nova (Ribera d'Ebre) and San Fernando de Henares (Madrid) to host one of Europe's artificial intelligence (AI) gigafactories boasts unanimity. This Wednesday, Pedro Sánchez's government convened in Moncloa the representatives of who, for now, forms part of the consortium that has sponsored the project's candidacy for its first official family photo. For the Spanish government, the company that has been established for this technological project to become a reality in the State is an example of the "importance" of public-private collaboration, and it takes on even more "relevance" when considering that the companies that make up the consortium, and which hold the majority, are "leaders in their sectors," Moncloa highlighted in a statement.

Sateliot appeared at the center of Catalan public life in 2021, thanks to InfoK. The company, created three years earlier by a group of veterans from the telecommunications industry, was one of those responsible for Enxaneta, the first Catalan nanosatellite. At that time, it was still difficult to explain the idea of going to space to connect to the Internet of Things and send one message a day to receiving devices. Half a decade later, the company is already an aerospace benchmark, and aspires to fill space with 5G connectivity satellites for security forces, defense units, and strategic infrastructures. The executive director, Jaume Sanpera, receives Empreses in the company's brand new offices to talk about dual-use technologies, satellite constellations, and how to become friends with Elon Musk again.

The space industry claims its economic impact, beyond the mysticism and symbolic weight that have traditionally surrounded it. "We have gone from planting flags to building markets, this is the great change," said the general director of Indra Space, Miguel Ángel Panduro, this Tuesday in Santander. The executive defended that "space has become a critical infrastructure for the economy" because it facilitates the operation of many other sectors, among which he highlighted the energy, logistics, and financial sectors.

Edició de Premsa Periòdica Ara SL develops Goita Barcelona, an artificial intelligence agent from Diari ARA designed to help users discover cultural, gastronomic, and leisure plans in Barcelona based on selected sources, context, and editorial criteria.

Philippe Aghion (Paris, 1956) won last year the Nobel Prize in Economics for his research on the impact of technology and innovation on economic development. Aghion, a professor at the prestigious Collège de France, Insead, and London School of Economics, currently focuses his work on the role of artificial intelligence (AI) in growth and how Europe can improve its policies to reduce dependence on Chinese and American tech giants.

The winner of the 2025 Nobel Prize in Economics, Philippe Aghion, has championed from Barcelona the effects of artificial intelligence on the economy. According to the expert's calculations, AI can add more than one percentage point to total productivity over a decade. The new contributions, however, are conditional on countries' ability to "build the right institutions" to regulate and promote it. "AI has great potential, but we need to adapt our policies to take advantage of it," he argued at a conference held this Tuesday at the headquarters of the Cercle d'Economia.

"Everyone needs a computer". This idea, a triviality at first glance, is at the core of the business model of a young Catalan startup that has managed, without raising external capital, to be profitable in just four months of activity. This is Walter!, a start-up founded by entrepreneurs Marc Ginjaume, Carlos Andion, and Juan Dávila that centralizes and handles all IT demand from clients, mainly other startups and tech companies. From the supply of computers and other technological devices to cybersecurity, including the maintenance of broken products, Walter! equips teams in "hypergrowth phase" of between 50 and 1,000 employees. And it does so – the crux of the matter – in less than 48 hours and in more than 150 countries.