The digital economy in Spain: 27% of Spanish GDP.

The 6th Edition of the Report on the Digital Economy, presented by A digital, believes that by 2025 the digital economy will represent 27.01% of Spanish GDP. It is a clear sign that digitisation can no longer be seen as a layer of modernisation, but as a real infrastructure for competitiveness, productivity and the transformation of the economic model.

This figure represents an improvement of 1.01 points on the 2024 figure and an increase of 8.31 points since 2019. In absolute terms, the total impact of digitalisation stands at 455.3 billion euros, representing a 10% increase on the previous year. Growth is somewhat slower than in previous periods, but remains higher than that of the economy as a whole, confirming an underlying trend: digitalisation continues to expand in a structural and cross-cutting manner.

The digital economy is no longer a sector

One of the report's most relevant contributions is methodological and conceptual. It doesn't just measure the digital economy in the strict sense – platforms, ICT services, or purely digital businesses – but the digitised economy, meaning the set of activities that already operate supported by digital goods, services, and processes. This perspective is important because it is much closer to reality. Today, the economic value of digitalisation lies not only in companies born digital, but in how traditional sectors transform their value chain, their productivity, and their relationship with clients and suppliers through technology.

In this regard, the report breaks down the impact into three layers. The direct impact amounts to 13,42% of GDP; the indirect impact, associated with the knock-on effect on other supply chains, amounts to 12.49%; and the induced impact, linked to the increased consumption generated by digitalised employment, stands at 1.10%. The overall picture is clear: digitalisation not only generates activity for those who adopt it, but also has a multiplier effect across the entire economic system.

The industry is digitising better than services

One of the most suggestive points of the study is that, Contrary to a common perception, digitalisation contributes more to gross value added in industry than in services.. The sectoral chart in the report puts this contribution at around 30.55% in industry, compared with 18.18% in services and 1.61% in construction.

The explanation put forward by Adigital is quite convincing. In industry, digitalisation typically operates on the very core of production: automation, digital twins, predictive maintenance, advanced ERP systems, process optimisation, and data integration. In other words, each technological improvement translates more directly into productive efficiency and value generation.

However, in a large part of the Spanish service sector, especially in very fragmented segments, digitalisation often remains more superficial: online presence, digital payments, marketing or improvement of the customer experience, but less profound transformation of the operating model.

It's not bad news in itself, but it is a wake-up call: there is still a lot of scope for services to digitise beyond the commercial layer.

Four representative sectors

The report also goes into detail about several particularly illustrative sectors.

Anglia Retail, digitalisation is no longer about “having e-commerce,” but about operating truly unified commerce: store, web, app, marketplaces, payments, inventory and logistics under the same logic. Hybrid purchasing, the cloud, AI applied to forecasting and personalisation, and the modernisation of the point of sale are consolidating a new operational normal.

Anglia automotive and aftermarket, the study shows how omni-channel strategies, DMS systems and the digitalisation of used vehicles are completely reconfiguring the commercial experience and the distribution chain. The physical dealership is not disappearing, but its role is changing: less of an information point, more of a space for closing deals, delivery and service.

Anglia Fintech and Insurtech, the conclusion is that the ecosystem has moved from disruption to structural maturity. We are no longer just talking about experimental startups, but about layers of digital infrastructure, automation, open banking, embedded finance, personalisation, and real scalability.

And in the audiovisual, digitalisation already appears as infrastructure for production and monetisation: cloud workflows, automation, OTT platforms, real-time audience data, non-linear distribution, and new forms of user engagement.

Regulation and governance of agent AI

Although the headline might be about the weight on GDP, the most strategic part of the document likely comes with the identification of the two major levers that will condition the next leap forward for the digital economy: regulatory simplification and the governance of agentic AI.

And this combination is especially interesting because it avoids two fairly common mistakes. The first, thinking that digital growth depends solely on technological adoption. The second, believing that more regulation automatically equates to better market order.

The report clearly argues that regulation can be a lever for confidence, investment, and growth, but also a barrier when it becomes excessive, fragmented, or difficult to implement. The figure it uses to illustrate this is very telling: European technology companies allocate up to 30% of their resources to regulatory compliance.

From that perspective, simplifying does not mean lowering standards, but rather improving regulatory quality. The document talks about eliminating duplication, harmonising frameworks, and avoiding gold plating national, strengthen dialogue with the private sector, use RegTech and SupTech to automate compliance and supervision, and move towards instruments such as single windows, the “once only” principle, or periodic legislative reviews.

For any CEO or CMO with transformation responsibility, this part of the report is very practical reading: digital competitiveness doesn't just depend on talent, investment, or technological ambition. It also depends on how much energy the system consumes managing regulatory complexity versus how much it can dedicate to innovating, scaling, and creating value.

The other major focus of the report is the Agentic AI, systems capable of perceiving, planning, deciding and executing complex actions with limited human supervision. The study posits that their economic potential could reach 450 billion dollars in just three years.

Beyond the figure, the important thing is that we are entering a phase where AI is ceasing to be just a support or generation tool and is beginning to become a layer of operational autonomy. And that forces a change in the type of governance. Adigital proposes a logic of continuous control based on three pillars: control over capabilities and actions, operational security throughout the entire environment, and observability of system behaviour. The underlying idea is not to wait to supervise ex post when the system has already acted, but to build control frameworks throughout its entire lifecycle.

Sandboxes, from exception to infrastructure

There is a third idea from the report that merits special attention: the role of the regulatory sandboxes.

They do not appear solely as a point test environment, but as an infrastructure for learning, coordination, and market deployment, especially useful in areas of high technological uncertainty. The text even proposes evolving towards an architecture of “Sandbox generation engines”reusing learnings, documentation, methodologies, and criteria across different test environments.

Transform the sandbox from a controlled experiment into something more: positioning it as an economic policy tool for reducing uncertainty, accelerating innovation, and improving regulatory quality.

What are we left with?

From MIG PRISMA, As partners of Adigital, we welcome the publication of this report and highlight three particularly valuable conclusions.

1. The digital economy is no longer a promise. It is a substantial part of the country's real growth.
2. The next leap will not depend solely on adopting more technology, but on creating better conditions for that adoption to be scalable, competitive, and operable.
3. The conversation about AI, regulation, and competitiveness can no longer take place in watertight compartments. It will require a more integrated vision across business, technology, regulation, and economic policy.

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