Building Robots Is Not Enough

I keep coming back to the same question when writing about European technology: what exactly do we want to keep in Europe? The usual answer is something like: semiconductor production, cloud infrastructure, AI models and perhaps a few strategically important factories. But after reading about French robotics company Wandercraft (https://en.wandercraft.eu/) and its cooperation with Renault, I think there is another part of the story that deserves much more attention. Europe should not only build products. It should also build the machines that build those products.

That may sound slightly old-fashioned in a world where almost every discussion about technology quickly turns into a discussion about software and AI. But there is a very practical reason for it. If you build your own production machines, you learn from them. You discover that a certain component is unnecessarily expensive. That another part could be lighter. That a production step takes too long. That a tolerance does not need to be quite so precise. Or that changing some software, mechanics or electronics could make the entire production process better.

In other words, a factory is not simply a place where products come off a production line. It is also a rather large laboratory.

Robots building European industrial knowledge

Wandercraft is an interesting example. The French company originally developed robotic exoskeletons for people who have difficulty walking. More than ten years of developing balance systems, actuators, mechanics and control software eventually resulted in something else: Calvin, a humanoid robot designed for industrial work.

And importantly, this isn’t primarily a robot designed to dance on a stage or generate spectacular YouTube videos. It is designed to work in a factory. Renault is already testing Calvin in its factory in Douai, where the robot moves things such as car tyres. Renault plans to have around 350 humanoid robots working in its French and Spanish factories by the end of 2027.

But the really interesting part is the relationship between the two companies. Renault is not simply buying robots from Wandercraft. It is also helping the company figure out how to manufacture those robots at scale. Wandercraft brings robotics and AI knowledge. Renault brings decades of experience in mass production, supply chains, quality control and designing products that can actually be manufactured at an acceptable cost. That combination makes a lot of sense.

Keep the feedback loop close

There is another detail I particularly like. Wandercraft says the components in its current robot all come from Europe. That matters. Because if the robot is designed in Europe, manufactured using European components, deployed in European factories and improved based on what happens in those factories, you create a very useful feedback loop: engineers see what breaks, factories discover what works, production specialists improve how the robot itself is manufactured and developers adjust the software and control systems. And then you do it all over again. That is industrial knowledge being created continuously. Move too many parts of that chain elsewhere and eventually part of that knowledge moves with it.

Europe already has an enormous high-quality manufacturing base, many specialised machine builders and companies that know how to manufacture complicated products at scale. We sometimes seem strangely eager to underestimate how valuable that is.

Perhaps technological sovereignty is not only about owning an AI model or running a European cloud. Sometimes it is also about knowing how to build the machine that builds the machine.

Here is a video of Andreas Klinger from the European investment fund PROTOTYPE (https://www.prototypecap.com/) visiting Wandercraft.

School Directors Are Making the Wrong Choice Between Tech and Privacy

I came across an article by Privacy First about the digital student, and it touches on something that continues to bother me about the way we discuss technology in European education. The discussion is often framed as a choice: we can embrace digital technology in schools, or we can protect the privacy of our children.That is the wrong choice.

You can find the article here: https://privacyfirst.nl/artikelen/de-digitale-leerling/ (text in Dutch). Privacy First rightly points out that schools process enormous amounts of information about pupils, ranging from names and contact details to school results, behaviour and sometimes information about a child’s development. Children are particularly vulnerable because they usually have little choice about the software their school tells them to use.

But the conclusion shouldn’t be that schools therefore need less technology. They need different technology: technology that respects privacy and complies with privacy laws.

Digital does not automatically mean Google

There is absolutely no law of nature saying that digital education requires Chromebooks, Google Workspace, Microsoft 365, Windows laptops or MacBooks. A school can give students Linux laptops. It can use Nextcloud or similar open source platforms for storing and sharing files, working together on documents, calendars, video calls and all the other things schools nowadays expect from a digital workplace.

And before somebody says that this sounds nice in theory but could never work for hundreds of thousands of users: it already does. The French region Île-de-France has deployed a sovereign collaboration environment based on Nextcloud for around 550,000 pupils, teachers and administrative staff. The system is part of the regional monlycée.net environment and was explicitly designed as an alternative to Microsoft solutions. It includes document collaboration through Collabora Online, file storage and integration with the region’s existing systems. The infrastructure is operated in France.

You read that right: half a million users. So perhaps we can finally stop pretending that European and open source alternatives are lovely little hobby projects that might work for three enthusiasts and a Raspberry Pi. See https://nextcloud.com/fr/blog/cloud-souverain-plateforme-collaborative-ile-de-france/ for more information.

We became lazy buyers of IT

There is another part of this discussion that I think we don’t talk about enough. A Belgian CIO recently said something to me that stuck: we have forgotten that we actually have to make conscious choices ourselves.

For many years it was incredibly easy not to choose. Microsoft was already there, so you bought some more Microsoft. Your organisation was using AWS, so the next workload went to AWS as well. Google offered a complete education package, so schools bought Chromebooks and Google services.

You could call that standardisation. I increasingly call it convenience. Or perhaps there is a better word for it: laziness. And that is dangerous, because over time, that convenience has turned into dependency.

That dependency matters much more today than it did ten or fifteen years ago. Europe has become deeply dependent on a relatively small number of American technology companies for cloud computing, productivity software, communication and increasingly AI. In their article, Privacy First has made essentially the same broader point about Europe’s dependence on foreign technology providers and the consequences for autonomy and control over data. With today’s geopolitical uncertainty, treating that dependency as merely a procurement detail is becoming increasingly difficult.

Of course you cannot migrate an entire organisation in a day. Nobody sensible is suggesting that. Île-de-France didn’t do that either. But that argument is rapidly becoming an excuse. If you are responsible for IT in a sizeable European organisation and you are still not investigating alternatives, testing them, identifying dependencies and developing a realistic migration path, I think you have a problem. Migration takes years. Which is precisely why you need to start before circumstances force you to.

And then there are the children

There is something particularly uncomfortable about teaching children about privacy, data protection and digital literacy while at the same time making them use platforms built by some of the world’s largest data-driven technology companies. Privacy First argues that privacy should not simply be another compliance box for schools to tick. It should be a basic design principle of the digital environment children grow up in.

I couldn’t agree more with that conclusion. We have GDPR. We have endless discussions about children’s online safety. We teach pupils to think carefully about what they share online. And then institutions themselves make the fundamental technology choices on their behalf.

Schools deserve support from governments and IT specialists to make better choices. But eventually somebody also has to take responsibility. The technology exists. The alternatives exist. Large-scale examples exist. Île-de-France is already showing that hundreds of thousands of pupils and teachers can work digitally without simply handing the entire environment to Microsoft or Google.

So this really isn’t a discussion about digital versus privacy. It is about whether school directors are willing to do the homework required to have both.

China is Doing what Europe keeps Talking about — But Moving Much Faster

I recently went looking for a story I remembered reading about China replacing Windows with Linux. I could not find it at first, probably because I was searching for the wrong thing.

There is no single Chinese order saying that everybody has to throw Windows out. What China has been doing is much more interesting: step by step, it has been reducing its dependence on foreign technology, particularly within government organisations, state-owned companies and strategically important sectors.

The name that keeps coming up is Xinchuang, China’s programme to replace foreign technology with domestic alternatives (https://www.mof.gov.cn/jrttts/202312/t20231226_3924138.htm). That includes processors, databases, applications and operating systems. Chinese government procurement rules introduced in recent years increasingly require systems to meet domestic “safe and reliable” requirements. In practice, that has created much more room for operating systems such as Kylin and UnionTech UOS, both based on Linux.

And China has just taken another step. In August 2026, reports emerged (for example https://www.tomshardware.com/software/operating-systems/china-reportedly-orders-state-agencies-to-uninstall-its-government-only-edition-of-windows-10) that China’s Ministry of State Security had instructed some state-linked organisations to remove Windows 10 China Government Edition earlier than originally planned. This is important nuance: China has not banned Windows everywhere. The order concerns a special government version and a limited part of the Chinese market. Windows is still widely used by consumers and businesses.

Perhaps we should pay more attention to China

Still, I think the direction is interesting. Not because Europe should copy China’s political system or its approach to technology. Obviously not. But there is one thing China seems to understand very well: becoming extremely dependent on a handful of foreign technology companies is a strategic risk.

That is something Europe has been talking about for years. Digital sovereignty, strategic autonomy, European clouds, open source, sovereign AI. Plenty of conferences, reports and policy documents. But meanwhile we keep buying. And buying. And buying.

The numbers are rather impressive. A European Commission document published this year cites research estimating that European companies’ purchases of cloud software add around €264 billion annually to the US economy (https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?qid=1745691400115&uri=CELEX%3A52026SC0502&)

Then there is the price issue. Research commissioned by French CIO association Cigref found that European organisations saw cloud and software costs increase by an average 8.7 percent per year during the past three years. Some organisations experienced much larger increases when contracts were renewed. The same research expects average annual increases of around 12 percent during the coming five years. (https://www.cio-platform.nl/en/weblog/nieuws-extern-detailpagina/2026/07/02/rapidly-rising-cloud-and-software-costs-weigh-on-the-european-economy?)

That 8.7 percent figure is not specifically an “American cloud inflation rate”, so we should be careful with that. But combine rapidly increasing software and cloud prices with Europe’s enormous spending on predominantly American technology and it becomes clear that we are talking about very serious amounts of money. Digital sovereignty is therefore not just about geopolitics. It is also about economics.

I decided to start with myself

I have been gradually trying to reduce my own dependence on Big Tech. My laptop comes from a European company (Slimbook), although calling a computer completely European is almost impossible: the CPU and GPU in mine are from AMD. I use Linux as my operating system. Nearly all the software and cloud services I use are now European, open source, or both.

I came from a MacBook and an iPhone and switched to Linux Mint and Murena /e/OS, a de-Googled version of the open-source version of Android. And to be honest, it works differently in some ways, but certainly not worse.

So personally, I made the switch, and I’m perfectly happy with the result. The difficult part is often not my own technology. It is other people’s technology. Clients still invite me into SharePoint environments. People create WhatsApp groups and simply assume everybody uses WhatsApp. Publishing workflows are still often built around Adobe software. In those situations, digital independence suddenly becomes less of an individual decision. You are part of an ecosystem, and ecosystems are difficult to leave.

But migration costs money…

This is probably one of the biggest obstacles Europe faces as well. One argument I often hear is that replacing existing technology is expensive and risky. Of course it is. If an organisation has spent ten or twenty years building processes around Microsoft 365, Azure, AWS, Google Cloud or Adobe, you cannot simply switch everything off on Friday afternoon and start again with European alternatives on Monday morning. People have to be trained. Applications have to be migrated. Interfaces have to be rebuilt. Data needs to move. Some functionality may not have an equivalent. And some projects will undoubtedly go wrong.

So yes, reducing dependency costs money. But keeping the dependency has a cost too. And that part of the calculation seems to receive much less attention – even by business managers who consider themselves financially savvy. What happens if prices continue to rise by almost 9 percent every year? What happens if a supplier changes its licensing model? What happens if political relations deteriorate badly? And, perhaps the uncomfortable question: what happens if access itself becomes part of a geopolitical conflict?

Canada suddenly makes that question less theoretical

This is why I am watching the current trade conflict between Canada and the United States with some interest. See for example here: https://www.reuters.com/business/trump-time-teach-canada-you-cant-do-this-anymore-2026-08-26/?. Relations between two countries that have been extremely close economic partners for decades have deteriorated remarkably quickly. In August, the US imposed 50 percent tariffs on roughly $20 billion worth of Canadian goods, after which Canada announced matching retaliatory measures.

So far, this is a trade conflict involving physical goods and tariffs. I have seen no evidence that the US government intends to restrict Canadian access to Microsoft 365, Azure, AWS, Google Cloud or other American digital services. But it does raise an interesting question.

Could digital services eventually become economic or political leverage as well?

I don’t know. And that is precisely the problem.

For years we have treated cloud platforms, office software and other digital services almost as utilities. They are just there. We log in every morning and assume they will still be there tomorrow. China clearly doesn’t want to make that assumption. Europe shouldn’t either.

We don’t have to replace everything tomorrow. That would be unrealistic and probably counterproductive. But we could start doing exactly what China has been doing for years: identify dependencies, develop alternatives, change procurement policies and gradually move critical systems to technology over which we have more control. We do not need yet another conference about digital sovereignty. Not another declaration.

What we do need: start migrating. Because the best moment to reduce a dependency is probably while everything is still working.

Open or Open (AI) Washing?

The technology industry has a long history of using attractive words to create a positive image. “Green”, “sustainable”, “responsible”, “sovereign” and now “open” are all terms that sound reassuring. But increasingly, these words are also becoming part of a familiar marketing strategy: make a product or service appear more independent, transparent or responsible than it really is.

We have seen this before with greenwashing. Companies present themselves as environmentally friendly while the reality behind their operations is often much more complex. A few sustainability initiatives or carefully chosen words can create the impression that a company is leading the way, even when the underlying business model has barely changed.

The same pattern is now appearing in other areas of technology. Open washing and sovereignty washing have become part of the same playbook.

Recently, I read an interesting article on Tech Policy Press titled “Open washing is everywhere in AI. Four criteria cut through it.” The author is J.J. Jasser, a professor and director of data analytics at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida. His research examines artificial intelligence, open-source development, and digital literacy. He also contributes commentary on technology and digital literacy to the Orlando Sentinel.

Jasser explains how the word “open” is increasingly being used in artificial intelligence as a marketing term rather than as a clear technical description. The problem is that “open” can mean many different things. A company may release parts of an AI model, publish limited documentation or offer access through an interface, and then present the technology as open. But true openness requires much more: transparency about development, access to relevant information, the ability to inspect and adapt the technology, and meaningful freedom for users. As the author points out, companies often highlight the elements that support the “open” label while keeping important limitations less visible.

This is exactly why open washing deserves attention. The term creates a sense of trust and independence, while the actual level of openness may be far more limited. The same applies to digital sovereignty. In Europe, concerns about dependence on large technology providers have grown significantly. Organisations want more control over their data, infrastructure and AI capabilities. Big Tech companies have responded by introducing so-called sovereign cloud offerings and European cloud regions.

At first glance, this sounds like the solution Europe has been looking for. Data is stored in Europe, services are operated locally and the word “sovereign” appears prominently in the marketing material. But sovereignty is about much more than location. Who owns the technology? Who controls the software? Which laws apply? Where is the company based? Can customers realistically move away if circumstances change? These are the questions that matter.

Using a European data center does not automatically create digital sovereignty. Just as adding a green label does not automatically make a company sustainable, adding the word sovereign does not automatically create independence.

Unfortunately, many C-level executives still fall for these messages. Under pressure to make decisions about cloud, AI and digital transformation, it is tempting to rely on vendor promises and attractive terminology. But technology leaders need to look beyond the marketing language and examine the real level of control they have.

The lesson from the discussion around open AI is therefore much broader. Whether it is greenwashing, open washing or sovereignty washing, the mechanism is the same: take a concept with a strong positive meaning and use it to improve perception.

The answer is not to reject everything Big Tech offers. Many of these technologies are valuable and play an important role in modern organisations. But companies need to ask harder questions and demand more transparency. Because in the end, words like “open”, “green” and “sovereign” only matter when they are backed by reality. A label is easy to create. Genuine openness, sustainability and independence are much harder to achieve.

The Space Economy Is Taking Off

I have always been fascinated by space. Not only because of the spectacular images from distant galaxies, the engineering challenge of launching rockets, or the incredible scientific discoveries made by missions exploring our solar system. What fascinates me even more is the fact that space technology is increasingly becoming part of our everyday lives.

For many years, space was something that belonged mainly to governments, research institutes and a handful of large aerospace companies. Satellites were expensive, rockets were rare, and space exploration felt like something far removed from our daily reality. That is changing rapidly.

The latest Space Economy Report from the European Space Agency (ESA) shows how quickly space is developing into a mature economic sector. Space is no longer only about exploration and scientific missions. It has become an essential infrastructure layer for modern society — supporting communication, navigation, climate monitoring, agriculture, logistics, security and many other industries. And this is only the beginning.

From government projects to a global commercial ecosystem

One of the most interesting developments of recent years is the shift from a government-driven space sector towards a much broader commercial ecosystem. Companies are building satellites, developing launch services, analysing Earth observation data and creating completely new services based on information collected from orbit. The cost of entering space is decreasing, partly because of reusable launch technology, smaller satellites and more efficient manufacturing processes.

This has created opportunities for thousands of companies that would never have been considered “space companies” in the past. A farmer using satellite images to optimise irrigation is benefiting from space technology. A logistics company using precise positioning data relies on satellites. A telecommunications provider offering connectivity in remote areas depends on orbital infrastructure. And thanks to satellite data, governments can respond much more effectively to natural disasters such as wildfires, floods and earthquakes. In many ways, satellites are becoming the “cloud infrastructure in space”.

Europe’s role in the new space economy

As someone who follows technology, digital sovereignty and autonomy, and European innovation closely, I find the European perspective particularly interesting. The space economy is not only about economic growth. It is also about strategic independence. Just as Europe is discussing digital autonomy in areas such as cloud computing, artificial intelligence and semiconductor technology, space infrastructure is becoming a strategic asset as well.

Reliable access to satellite data, navigation systems and communication capabilities is increasingly important for governments, companies and society as a whole. Europe has strong capabilities in space technology. Organisations such as ESA, national space agencies, research institutes and a growing number of innovative companies are contributing to a competitive European space ecosystem. The challenge therefore is not whether Europe has the knowledge or the technology. The challenge is turning that expertise into scalable businesses and ensuring that Europe remains an important player in a rapidly growing global market.

The connection between space and artificial intelligence

Another reason why the space economy is becoming increasingly interesting is the connection with artificial intelligence. Satellites generate enormous amounts of data. Every day, they collect information about our planet, weather systems, oceans, cities and industrial activities. But collecting data is only the first step. The real value comes from analysing it.

AI will play a crucial role in turning satellite data into information we can actually use in daily (business) life. At the same time, space itself creates new challenges for AI. Processing data closer to where it is generated — potentially directly in orbit — could become increasingly important as the amount of information from satellites continues to grow.

One of the reasons I enjoy following developments in space technology is that they show how innovation often crosses traditional boundaries. Space is no longer an isolated industry. It connects with telecommunications, energy, manufacturing, defence, agriculture, logistics, climate technology and artificial intelligence. The same technologies that help us explore distant planets are also helping us solve problems here on Earth. This is perhaps the most exciting aspect of the new space economy: it is not about escaping from our planet. It is about understanding, protecting and improving it. And that makes this report a very interesting read.

Nextcloud on the Beach

A new episode of my “De Overstap” series has just been published on Computable.nl. In this series, I write about my own attempts to move away from the usual Big Tech ecosystem and see how far you can get with European, open source and more independent alternatives.

Episode 9 became something of a holiday edition. This summer I travelled with my family to the south of France with a tech setup that was almost completely free of the platforms I used to depend on. My laptop was my Slimbook Evo running Linux Mint, while my phone was a Fairphone 6 with Murena’s /e/OS. And yes, for the most part it worked remarkably well.

There was one small adventure on the way. As soon as I crossed the border, my phone suddenly had no mobile internet. Everything seemed to be configured correctly, but eventually I discovered (thank you Mistral Vibefor helping me) that the correct KPN APN setting was simply missing. Once I added it manually, everything worked again.

That experience actually illustrates one of the main points of this new episode. Alternatives to Big Tech increasingly work perfectly well from a technical point of view. But if we really want ordinary users to adopt them, the learning curve still needs to come down. People should not have to know what an APN is just because they choose a different mobile operating system.

And then there was Nextcloud. I happened to wear an old Nextcloud T-shirt on the beach in France. To my surprise, several French people recognised the logo and started talking to me about Nextcloud, digital autonomy and European alternatives. Hardly scientific market research, of course, but still interesting. Open source alternatives such as Nextcloud seem to be slowly moving beyond their traditional technical audience.

The article also includes my latest experiences with Capacities.io for personal knowledge management, plus a few other interesting alternatives I recently came across, including littleFedi, soev.ai and the Dutch Matrix service mtux.nl.

You can read De Overstap 9: Nextcloud op het strand on Computable.nl: https://www.computable.nl/2026/08/17/de-overstap-9-nextcloud-op-het-strand/.

Why DeepL Shows That Europe Can Build World-Class Technology

I recently read an interview with one of DeepL’s founders. It offered an interesting and rather different perspective on how AI is developing in Europe. When people talk about artificial intelligence, the conversation often quickly moves to Silicon Valley. The names are familiar: OpenAI, Google, Microsoft, Anthropic or Meta. Europe is frequently described as a continent that regulates technology rather than creates it.

I have always found that narrative too simplistic. Europe may not produce dozens of giant consumer technology platforms, but it does have companies that build highly advanced technology with a very different approach. A good example is DeepL, the Cologne-based AI company that started with machine translation and has grown into one of Europe’s most successful artificial intelligence companies.

In an interview with Bechtle, DeepL founder and CEO Jarek Kutylowski explains why the company has taken a different path from many AI competitors. His message is interesting because it is not about creating the loudest AI story. It is about building technology that people can trust and actually use.

Quality before hype

One of the most striking points from Kutylowski is his focus on quality. DeepL did not become successful by trying to be everywhere at once. Instead, the company concentrated on one very specific problem: making translations better. That sounds simple, but it is exactly where many AI projects struggle. The current AI landscape is full of impressive demonstrations, prototypes and experiments. However, moving from an exciting demo to reliable business use is a completely different challenge.

Kutylowski argues that companies need AI systems that deliver consistent results, especially when they are used in professional environments. A translation error in a casual conversation may be annoying. A wrong translation in a legal document, medical communication or international business process can have much bigger consequences. This focus on reliability is one of the reasons why DeepL has built such a strong reputation.

An opportunity in AI

The success of DeepL also challenges the idea that Europe cannot compete in artificial intelligence. Europe has a different technology culture. Issues such as privacy, security, transparency and control are often considered important from the start. For many organisations, especially in sectors like healthcare, government, finance and manufacturing, these are not secondary concerns. They are fundamental requirements.

In the interview Kutylowski highlights that AI adoption is not only about having the biggest models. It is about solving real problems for users and organisations. That is an important lesson. The future of AI will probably not belong only to companies that create the largest models. It will also belong to companies that understand specific industries, workflows and customer needs.

AI becomes part of everyday work

Another interesting point Kutylowski makes in the interview is the shift from AI experiments towards practical applications. Many organisations are currently exploring AI, but the real challenge is integration. How do you connect AI with existing processes? How do you make sure employees can use it effectively? How do you protect sensitive information?

This is where enterprise AI becomes very different from consumer AI. Businesses need control, security and predictable outcomes. DeepL’s move beyond translation into broader AI-powered communication tools reflects this change. AI is becoming less of a separate technology and more of an invisible layer within everyday business activities.

A more balanced view of artificial intelligence

The interview with Jarek Kutylowski offers a refreshing perspective in a time where AI discussions are often dominated by extremes. Some predict that AI will transform everything overnight. Others focus mainly on the risks. The reality is probably somewhere in between.

AI will change the way organisations work, but success will depend on thoughtful implementation. Companies need technology partners that understand not only algorithms, but also business processes, security requirements and human behaviour. DeepL is an interesting example because it shows another possible path for European technology: focused, specialised and built around trust.

The AI race is not only about who builds the biggest model. It is also about who builds technology that people are willing to use every day. And that is an area where Europe may have more strengths than many people realise.

Europe Doesn’t Need Its Own Big Tech. It Needs a More Diverse Internet

For quite some time now, Europe’s debate about digital sovereignty has largely revolved around one question: how do we reduce our dependence on American Big Tech?

It is an understandable concern. European governments, businesses and public institutions depend heavily on a relatively small group of US companies for cloud infrastructure, workplace software, search, social media, advertising, mobile ecosystems and increasingly artificial intelligence. That concentration creates questions around control, jurisdiction, data, resilience and economic power.

But there is a danger in defining digital sovereignty too narrowly. If Europe simply replaces American Big Tech with European Big Tech, we may change the nationality of the companies involved without solving the underlying problem. What Europe needs is not merely European technology. It needs technological diversity.

Monoculture is the real vulnerability

Hamish Campbell, who writes extensively about the open web and the Open Media Network, makes an important distinction. The problem with today’s internet is not simply that companies such as Google, Meta or Amazon have become extremely powerful. It is that digital infrastructure has developed into something resembling a monoculture.

When a small number of platforms dominate communications, infrastructure and online identity, dependency follows. Dependency gives those platforms control, while concentration makes the wider ecosystem vulnerable. Campbell therefore argues that the answer cannot be another monoculture carrying different branding.

That observation is particularly relevant to the European sovereignty debate. Imagine Europe successfully creates one major European cloud provider, one dominant European social network, one European AI platform and one European office-software ecosystem. European institutions might become less dependent on US companies, but customers could still face exactly the same structural problems: vendor lock-in, difficult migrations, concentrated market power and enormous dependence on individual suppliers. Sovereignty without diversity can simply create a different dependency.

We need an ecosystem, not a champion

Europe therefore needs to look beyond the traditional idea that every technology market requires a handful of very large “champions”.

The open web offers a different model. Instead of searching for one platform capable of replacing Facebook, X, Microsoft or Google, the objective can be to create an ecosystem in which many different services coexist and communicate through open standards.

Campbell describes the open web as something that should deliberately be messy: different technologies, organisations, communities and approaches existing alongside each other rather than converging on one supposedly perfect solution.

That messiness may actually be an advantage. A healthy digital ecosystem could include commercial companies, open-source projects, cooperatives, universities, public infrastructure providers and thousands of smaller hosting and software businesses. Some might operate locally, others internationally. They would not necessarily use identical technology, provided that open standards and interoperability allow users and information to move between them.

The comparison with biodiversity is obvious. An ecosystem containing many different species is generally more capable of adapting when circumstances change than one dominated by a single organism. Digital infrastructure deserves the same thinking.

Federation alone is not enough

The Fediverse demonstrates some of these possibilities. Instead of one company owning the entire social network, independent servers can communicate through common protocols such as ActivityPub. But decentralisation at the technical level does not automatically guarantee decentralisation in practice.

Campbell warns that federated systems can decentralise servers while gradually recentralising culture, governance and influence. The challenge is therefore not simply scaling the infrastructure. Communities, governance structures and shared social infrastructure must scale with it.

That lesson should be taken seriously in Europe. Building alternatives to hyperscalers is not enough if those alternatives eventually follow precisely the same path: consolidation, acquisition, platform concentration and lock-in.

Dependency is remarkably difficult to escape

There is another reason diversity matters. Once a platform becomes deeply embedded in everyday economic and social activity, leaving becomes increasingly difficult.

A small business may depend on Instagram to reach customers. A community organisation might coordinate activities through Facebook. Friends and families may communicate through WhatsApp. Companies can build entire business processes around one cloud provider. Campbell describes this as an infrastructure problem rather than simply an individual choice. People cannot easily leave dominant platforms when everyone and everything they need remains there.

Twenty years of platform dominance have therefore created something much deeper than market share. They have created habits, dependencies, technical architectures and network effects that reinforce one another.

Sovereignty should mean having choices

This changes the meaning of digital sovereignty. True digital autonomy should not mean that every server, application or cloud service must carry a European flag. Nor should it mean creating European equivalents of every American hyperscaler.

It should mean that organisations retain meaningful choices. They should be able to change providers without rebuilding their entire IT environment. Data should be portable. Standards should be open. Different platforms should interoperate. Open-source alternatives should remain viable. Smaller providers should be able to participate without first becoming hyperscalers themselves.

The strategic objective should therefore be bigger than replacing Big Tech. Europe needs an internet and technology industry where no single company becomes indispensable in the first place. Because the strongest form of digital sovereignty is not owning the next hyperscaler. It is not needing one.

De Overstap: My Search for a More Sovereign Digital Life

Over the past few months, I have been writing a regular blog for Dutch IT publication Computable.nl called De Overstap (text is in Dutch)— which roughly translates as Making the Switch.

The subject is digital sovereignty. But rather than approaching it primarily as a policy discussion, I am trying to look at a much more practical question: what actually happens when individuals and organisations try to reduce their dependence on Big Tech?

There is no shortage of discussion in Europe about digital sovereignty, technological autonomy and the dominance of mainly American hyperscalers. What interests me is what happens after that discussion. Which alternatives already exist? Are they good enough? What makes migration difficult? And are European and open-source solutions genuinely usable in everyday working environments?

Computable describes the series as a guide for IT professionals and decision-makers looking for alternative business solutions. So far, seven editions have been published.

It started with my MacBook

The first edition, “How do I get rid of my MacBook?”, was deliberately personal. After years inside Apple’s ecosystem, I moved much of my daily work to Linux, LibreOffice, Thunderbird, Nextcloud and other predominantly European or open-source tools.

The interesting discovery was that the move itself was considerably easier than expected. But it also revealed something important: you never operate completely independently. Customers, colleagues and other organisations may still expect Microsoft Teams, Adobe software or proprietary file formats. Digital sovereignty is therefore not simply a matter of choosing another laptop.

Half a million French students show what is possible

The second edition moved from my desk to the French education system. In Île-de-France, almost 550,000 students, teachers and staff use an environment based partly on Nextcloud and hosted using European infrastructure.

It is an interesting example because it demonstrates that open-source and European alternatives are not limited to enthusiasts or small experiments. They can operate at substantial scale. The article also looked at NLnet Labs moving projects from GitHub to Codeberg and at emerging European office platforms.

Open source needs an enterprise model too

Edition three examined an often overlooked problem. Having technically capable open-source software is not enough for large organisations. Enterprises also want contracts, support, accountability and somebody to call when something goes wrong.

One possible answer comes from organisations such as the Dutch Opensource Business Alliance, where specialist companies can work together in consortia and present customers with something resembling the service model they are accustomed to receiving from large proprietary vendors. The edition also explored European attitudes towards replacing US technology and alternatives to platforms such as GitHub and Notion.

Where does the money for migration come from?

Digital sovereignty sounds attractive until somebody asks who is going to pay for it.

The fourth De Overstap therefore looked at the economics of migration. One potentially useful approach is to examine existing IT contracts first. Organisations may be able to free up part of the necessary migration budget by benchmarking and renegotiating existing software and services agreements.

The broader point is that sovereignty cannot be treated purely as an architectural issue. Technology, procurement, contracts and financial planning are closely connected. This edition also examined the Dutch government’s decision to operate its own environment for hosting open-source code.

Sometimes you have to switch twice

My own migration did not proceed in a perfectly straight line either.

I originally switched from macOS to openSUSE on a Lenovo ThinkPad. It worked, but there were enough small issues — particularly involving hardware and some everyday applications — to interfere with my work. So I started again, this time with a Spanish Slimbook EVO running Linux Mint.

That experience became edition five. For me, Linux Mint turned out to be much closer to what mainstream users need: an operating environment that does not make the operating system itself a daily project. The article also looked at the contradictions that can arise when supposedly European services still depend on American cloud infrastructure.

The laptop was easy. Now for the smartphone

Edition six moved to perhaps the more difficult part of leaving Big Tech behind: the mobile phone.

My Linux laptop had by then become an ordinary piece of working equipment. My phone remained more complicated. Moving from an iPhone to a conventional Android device simply means moving from one dominant US ecosystem to another.

So I looked at European and more open alternatives, including France’s /e/OS and Murena and Finland’s Sailfish OS and Jolla. The article also explored developments around sovereign cloud infrastructure and European AI.

Convenience still beats principles surprisingly often

The seventh and, at the moment, most recent edition asks how much progress Europe is really making.

There are certainly more sovereign-cloud projects, open-source migrations and proofs of concept than there were only a short time ago. But there is also a striking contradiction. Organisations may discuss sovereignty, NIS2 and strategic dependence in one meeting, while adopting another service from Microsoft or another hyperscaler in the next.

That does not necessarily mean they do not understand the problem. Often the forces pulling in the opposite direction are very practical: existing platforms, perceived migration risks, pressure to introduce AI quickly and management’s desire to demonstrate immediate productivity improvements. Convenience, in other words, still frequently wins over principles.

A journey rather than a destination

That is probably why I enjoy writing De Overstap. It is not really a blog about replacing Microsoft, Apple, Google or AWS with a predetermined list of European products.

It is about discovering what genuine digital autonomy looks like in practice — including the compromises, failed experiments, unexpected alternatives and very ordinary usability issues that are easily forgotten in high-level debates about sovereignty.

And there is plenty more to explore.

All editions of De Overstap can be found here.

Europe Is Better at Tech Than We Like to Admit

I am personally very interested in digital sovereignty, digital autonomy, European technology and open-source software. Partly because I believe Europe needs more control over the technology on which our companies, governments and societies increasingly depend. The tools I use myself — from my laptop and phone to software applications — are almost exclusively European and/or open source.

At the same time, I sometimes — perhaps even often — get frustrated by the way this discussion is conducted, especially in the Netherlands. There is a persistent assumption that European technology does not amount to very much, that the United States has already won the technology race, and that open source is mostly something complicated for technically minded enthusiasts. I think that picture is far too simplistic.

There is certainly a technology gap in some areas. American hyperscalers dominate cloud computing, many of the most visible AI companies are American, and China has built formidable capabilities in areas such as manufacturing, batteries and robotics. Pretending otherwise would be pointless.

But there is another side to the story. Sometimes I also think CIOs and IT managers make things unnecessarily easy for themselves. If Microsoft, AWS or another established supplier already provides almost everything you need, it is tempting simply to buy whatever your preferred vendor puts in front of you. That is convenient. It reduces the number of suppliers, contracts and technologies that need to be evaluated. But convenience can easily turn into dependency.

European and open-source alternatives are therefore sometimes dismissed as being too difficult before they have even been seriously investigated. And in the Netherlands in particular, I sometimes feel there is too much pessimism surrounding European technology. We talk extensively about everything Europe cannot do, while paying considerably less attention to the areas in which European companies are genuinely world-class.

That was one of the reasons I was particularly interested in visiting Siemens Realize Live Europe in Amsterdam. I knew beforehand that Siemens would offer a rather different perspective on the global technology race.

Europe is not absent from the technology race

I recently wrote about the event for Computable.nl in an article titled “Siemens: Europa is ijzersterk op het gebied van industriële tech” (text is in Dutch). The central message is worth repeating: Europe may not always dominate the headlines surrounding artificial intelligence, cloud platforms or consumer technology, but in industrial technology its position is considerably stronger than the popular narrative sometimes suggests.

One of the most striking examples during the event involved UBTech, a well-known Chinese manufacturer of humanoid robots. At first sight, it appears to be another illustration of Europe’s supposed technological weakness. China builds advanced humanoid robots while Europe watches from the sidelines. Except that this is not what is actually happening.

Siemens demonstrated how UBTech uses technology from the Siemens Xcelerator portfolio to design, simulate, test, manufacture and manage its robots throughout their lifecycle. In other words, some highly advanced Chinese technology is being created with European industrial software and engineering technology.

That changes the picture considerably. Yes, the most visible product may be Chinese, while much of the engineering infrastructure behind it comes from Europe.

Industrial technology deserves more attention

This is perhaps one of the problems with the broader technology debate. We tend to judge technological strength by looking at the companies that are most visible to consumers. Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Apple, OpenAI, Meta and Nvidia naturally receive enormous amounts of media attention. Industrial technology is much less visible. Yet behind virtually every physical product is an enormously complex digital environment. Aircraft, cars, chips, machines, factories, energy systems and robots must be designed, simulated, tested, manufactured and maintained. And Europe has exceptionally strong companies in precisely those areas.

At Realize Live Europe, Siemens repeatedly emphasised this complete industrial digital chain. Its strategy increasingly revolves around what the company calls the digital thread: connecting information from chip and electronics design through mechanical engineering, simulation and manufacturing all the way to factory automation and maintenance.

That includes technologies from companies Siemens has acquired over the years, including Mentor Graphics, Altair and the originally Dutch low-code company Mendix. Instead of presenting these as separate software products, Siemens increasingly positions them as parts of a connected industrial technology platform.

AI, but not AI for AI’s sake

Artificial intelligence naturally played a major role at the event. What I found interesting, however, was that Siemens did not primarily present AI as yet another chatbot. The focus was much more practical. AI is being incorporated into engineering tools, simulation software, manufacturing systems and product lifecycle management. According to Siemens, AI already reduces the time required to create certain technical 2D drawings by around fifty percent, while parts can be classified in Teamcenter roughly ten times faster.

The company is also introducing AI agents capable of carrying out parts of engineering workflows. But engineers remain responsible for supervision and final decisions. This is an important distinction. In industrial environments, AI cannot simply generate something that looks plausible. Engineering information needs to be accurate, traceable and connected to the correct version of a product or production process. That is why Siemens places so much emphasis on data.

Intelligence Center X

One of the major announcements during Realize Live Europe was Intelligence Center X, which Siemens positions as an intelligent layer across its software portfolio. The idea is that AI agents can analyse information, initiate processes and support engineers while remaining connected to the underlying industrial data. Instead of copying enormous quantities of information into separate AI environments, the agents work with data stored in systems such as Teamcenter.

That is significant because industrial data changes continuously. A product configuration may change. A component may be replaced. A new engineering version may become available. Manufacturing parameters may be adjusted. AI systems therefore need more than access to data. They need access to the right and current data, including the context in which that information exists.

Traceability is equally important. Companies need to understand where information came from and why an AI system reached a particular conclusion. These requirements are rather different from those of consumer-oriented generative AI.

Simulation becomes part of design

Another fascinating development is happening in simulation. Traditionally, engineers often designed something first and then used simulation to determine whether the design would actually work. That process is changing. According to Siemens, the combination of GPU acceleration and what it calls Physics AI can make some simulations hundreds or even thousands of times faster.

Examples presented at the event illustrated the impact. Continental has reportedly reduced a complex airbag simulation from around two hours to less than thirty seconds. Magna reduced another simulation from fourteen hours to approximately ten seconds. Rolls-Royce is using Simcenter Simsolid to analyse engine designs much more quickly.

When simulations take seconds rather than hours, they become something very different. An engineer can test many different design options during the design process rather than using simulation mainly as a final verification step. That can potentially change the way products are developed.

AI enters the factory

The same development is happening inside factories. Siemens demonstrated how AI can analyse abnormalities in manufacturing processes and combine information from engineering systems, ERP software and production environments. Instead of requiring engineers to manually investigate every possible relationship between datasets, AI can identify correlations and suggest possible improvements. (Computable)

Again, this does not mean removing humans from the process. It means automating parts of the investigative work while leaving engineers in control. That appears to be an important theme in Siemens’ approach to industrial AI: moving from systems that simply answer questions towards software that can help execute complete processes.

And then there is digital sovereignty

For me, one of the most interesting elements of the Siemens story was its connection with digital sovereignty. Mendix plays an important role here. The Dutch low-code platform, acquired by Siemens in 2018, is becoming part of the company’s broader AI architecture. It can be used to create applications and agentic workflows in which humans and AI agents work together.

But there is also an infrastructure dimension. Siemens is working with German cloud provider STACKIT to allow certain Mendix environments to run on European cloud infrastructure. According to Siemens, this currently primarily concerns projects involving Dutch government organisations, but the approach is expected to expand. Siemens has also been talking with European cloud provider OVHcloud about hosting additional Siemens solutions on European infrastructure.

That is exactly the kind of development I believe deserves considerably more attention. Digital sovereignty should not simply mean complaining about Microsoft, AWS or Google. Nor should it mean replacing American Big Tech with European Big Tech. It should mean creating genuine technological choice. That requires European cloud infrastructure, open standards, open-source technologies, interoperable software and strong European technology companies.

Perhaps we should stop underestimating ourselves

The visit to Siemens Realize Live Europe reinforced something I have thought for some time. Europe certainly has technological weaknesses. We need more investment, more scale, stronger capital markets and probably much more ambition in several areas of digital technology.

But constantly repeating that Europe has already lost the technology race is not particularly helpful either. Because it is not entirely true.

Europe has deep expertise in industrial automation, engineering software, semiconductor technology, manufacturing systems, digital twins, telecommunications, embedded systems, machine building and many other technologies that rarely generate the headlines enjoyed by ChatGPT or the latest American cloud service.

And these technologies matter enormously. Sometimes they are even the technologies being used to create the highly visible American and Chinese innovations that we subsequently point to as evidence that Europe is falling behind. The Siemens event was a useful reminder that technological power is not always found where the headlines are.

You can read my original Dutch article for Computable, “Siemens: Europa is ijzersterk op het gebied van industriële tech” here.

Perhaps the discussion about European digital sovereignty would become more productive if we spent a little less time explaining why things cannot be done — and a little more time looking at the technology that Europe already has.