Data4Life, a nonprofit digital health organization with offices in Berlin, Potsdam and Singapore, and Huniverse Global, a leading Korean health technology company, have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to strengthen international collaboration in the field of digital health research.
The agreement, signed in October 25 in Seoul by Dr. Ben M.W. Illigens, CEO of Data4Life, and Prof. Sang-Heon Lee, CEO of Huniverse Global and Professor at the Department of Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation at Korea University Anam Hospital, marks the beginning of a strategic partnership aimed at creating a federated research network with data directly obtained from Korea University’s cloud-based precision medicine platform (P-HIS), enabling longitudinal studies on treatment outcomes, disease progression, and healthcare utilization patterns..
Building on Data4Life’s growing network of collaborations in South Korea, the partnership underscores the organization’s commitment to fostering global cooperation and ethical, interoperable data use in health research.
Accelerating research through federated data and open science
The collaboration will focus on making existing clinical data from Electronic Health Records (EHR) available for international research using Data4Life’s Data2Evidence platform. By leveraging Data2Evidence’s built-in OHDSI tool suite to analyse datasets standardized to the OMOP Common Data Model, the partners aim to enable standardized, privacy-preserving data sharing and federated analytics across institutions.
The cooperation will also focus on:
● Advancing AI applications in healthcare, including the implementation of large language models (LLMs) on electronic health records (EHR) to derive new clinical insights.
● Integration of unstructured data, such as imaging and pathology, to unlock new clinical insights.
● Collaboration on international grant applications and multi-center studies.
“Excellence comes from combining complementary strengths: Huniverse Global’s clinical datasets and our OMOP‑native, federated infrastructure,” said Dr. Ben Illigens, CEO of Data4Life. “Together, we will run federated
studies across borders and deliver measurable impact with analysis‑ready data and reproducible methods to move discoveries faster to the bedside.”
Prof. Sang-Heon Lee, CEO of Huniverse Global, added: “By leveraging Data4Life’s open-source analytics with our data harmonized to the OMOP CDM, we are building a research environment that bridges our clinical experts with the global research community, turning our regional health data into a powerful engine for global discovery.”
Connecting research across borders
The partnership between Data4Life and Huniverse Global expands a growing network of strategic collaborations between Europe and Asia, supporting Data4Life’s mission to unlock the value of real-world data, generating actionable evidence to augment clinical trials and to improve patient outcomes.
By leveraging open standards such as OMOP and FHIR, both partners aim to enable scalable, reproducible, and ethically responsible research that empowers scientists, clinicians, and patients alike.
The agreement, signed in October 25 in Seoul by Dr. Ben M.W. Illigens, CEO of Data4Life, and Prof. Sang-Heon Lee, CEO of Huniverse Global and Professor at the Department of Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation at Korea University Anam Hospital, marks the beginning of a strategic partnership aimed at creating a federated research network with data directly obtained from Korea University’s cloud-based precision medicine platform (P-HIS), enabling longitudinal studies on treatment outcomes, disease progression, and healthcare utilization patterns..
Building on Data4Life’s growing network of collaborations in South Korea, the partnership underscores the organization’s commitment to fostering global cooperation and ethical, interoperable data use in health research.
Accelerating research through federated data and open science
The collaboration will focus on making existing clinical data from Electronic Health Records (EHR) available for international research using Data4Life’s Data2Evidence platform. By leveraging Data2Evidence’s built-in OHDSI tool suite to analyse datasets standardized to the OMOP Common Data Model, the partners aim to enable standardized, privacy-preserving data sharing and federated analytics across institutions.
The cooperation will also focus on:
● Advancing AI applications in healthcare, including the implementation of large language models (LLMs) on electronic health records (EHR) to derive new clinical insights.
● Integration of unstructured data, such as imaging and pathology, to unlock new clinical insights.
● Collaboration on international grant applications and multi-center studies.
“Excellence comes from combining complementary strengths: Huniverse Global’s clinical datasets and our OMOP‑native, federated infrastructure,” said Dr. Ben Illigens, CEO of Data4Life. “Together, we will run federated
studies across borders and deliver measurable impact with analysis‑ready data and reproducible methods to move discoveries faster to the bedside.”
Prof. Sang-Heon Lee, CEO of Huniverse Global, added: “By leveraging Data4Life’s open-source analytics with our data harmonized to the OMOP CDM, we are building a research environment that bridges our clinical experts with the global research community, turning our regional health data into a powerful engine for global discovery.”
Connecting research across borders
The partnership between Data4Life and Huniverse Global expands a growing network of strategic collaborations between Europe and Asia, supporting Data4Life’s mission to unlock the value of real-world data, generating actionable evidence to augment clinical trials and to improve patient outcomes.
By leveraging open standards such as OMOP and FHIR, both partners aim to enable scalable, reproducible, and ethically responsible research that empowers scientists, clinicians, and patients alike.
