Cuenca’s digital age R & D center ICDEA (the Instituto del Conocimiento, la Digitalizacion y el Emprendedor Audiovisual) will open its doors May 2011, Juan Manuel Avila, president of the Diputacion Provincial de Cuenca announced Thursday in San Sebastian.

A joint venture of the Diputacion, the Junta de Comunidades de Castilla La Mancha and producers’ rights collection society Egeda, ICDEA, as previously announced, will oversee the digitalization and storage of Spanish films, according to a Diputacion- Egeda pact inked July 2008.

But ICDEA will serve other aims, Avila confirmed at San Sebastian. A new talent greenhouse, ICDEA will house a 10-company office space, an exhibition hall, inside an open air auditoriums, and launch various new media training initiatives. Its organizers have initiated talks with the E.U.MEDIA Progeam to further its training heft.

Francisco Ros, Spain’s secretary of state of Information Society Telecommunications, said ICDEA would receive euros 5.7 million ($8.1 million) in loans and subsidies.

ICDEA forms part of of the Spanish government’s Plan Avanza which, with a $2.5 billion budget for 2008, forms part of Spain’s attempt to transform into an advanced service economy and accelerate into the digital age.

EGEDA handles about 90% of Spanish film rights.

“We don’t know quite where technology will take us. But we have to advance hand in hand with it”, said Egeda prexy Enrique Cerezo.