Experts, politicians, and IT leaders discuss ways out of digital dependency at the Univention Summit

Bremen, January 28, 2025 – Under the motto “Ready for Digital Sovereignty?”, more than 750 representatives from software manufacturers, IT service providers, and user organizations gathered at the Univention Summit at the Congress Centrum Bremen on January 23 and 24 to exchange ideas on pathways to greater digital sovereignty.

The focus of the presentations on three stages was the question of how to quickly and efficiently digitize public administration and the education sector without falling into an even greater digital dependency on large American IT corporations. The recent statements from the Trump administration had further intensified existing concerns among many participants. The general consensus was that public procurement needs to change direction and enshrine open-source and open standards in procurement processes to maintain control and make the IT industry in Europe competitive. Univention itself presented the current version 5.2 of Univention Corporate Server (UCS) to the public for the first time at the Summit, which will be released on February 5, and provided an outlook on the roadmap for its solutions UCS, Nubus for Kubernetes, and UCS@school. Participants extensively utilized the Summit to explore modern and open IT solutions from over 40 software manufacturers, IT service providers, and Univention Partners in the exhibition and to network.

Highlights from the Lecture Program

The Summit was opened with a keynote by Univention CEO Peter Ganten, who acknowledged a significant threat posed by Chinese and American dominance in the IT sector but concluded that our economic and digital dependency is by no means sealed. The disruptive potential of new technologies, particularly in AI, is immense and feared by the tech giants, who attempt to counter it with vendor lock-in, platform effects, and marketing campaigns.

Renowned cybersecurity researcher Prof. Dr. Dennis-Kenji Kipker (cyberintelligence.institute) also emphasized the necessity of digital sovereignty for Europe and Germany, concluding: “It does not matter where the data is located, but who manages the data.”

High-Profile Panel from Politics, Science, and Industry Discusses Concrete Measures for Digital Sovereignty

In a panel discussion, Schleswig-Holstein’s Minister for Digitalization Dirk Schrödter, Jutta Horstmann (Head of ZenDiS), Dr. Laura Dornheim (CDO of the City of Munich), Prof. Dr. Dennis-Kenji Kipker, Ann Cathrin Riedel (LOAD e.V.), and Peter Ganten discussed strategies and concrete steps for enhancing digital sovereignty in administrations. Among other topics, they addressed the pros and cons of federative structures, the rationale for state regulation, the necessity of digitally sovereign IT infrastructures, and the importance of considering the use of open-source solutions right from the procurement stage.

Jutta Horstmann emphasized that we have an open flank with digital dependency, and Donald Trump will exploit any open flank.

This issue also concerned many other participants. Schleswig-Holstein’s Minister for Digitalization Dirk Schrödter emphasized:
“Ensuring digital sovereignty must be a top priority. It is at least as important as energy sovereignty. The Univention Summit has impressively demonstrated how we can ensure digital independence with open-source solutions and that we, as public administration, can achieve a digitally sovereign future together with companies across national borders.”

Frank Karlitschek, founder and CEO of Nextcloud, summarized:
“Europe has the tools to secure its digital sovereignty. However, these are not being utilized sufficiently. Proven and established open-source solutions are the only way to prevent Europe from becoming a digital colony.”

Peer Heinlein, founder and CEO of the Heinlein Group, spoke about his new collaboration platform presented to the public for the first time at the Summit:
“With OpenCloud, we presented next-generation file management: scalable, secure, and—of course—digitally sovereign. An important and correct response for politics, administration, and businesses.”

40 IT Manufacturers as Partners at the Univention Summit

In addition to the lecture program on the three stages, which was followed by another 250 participants via live stream, numerous workshops were held, including those by Univention partners. Notable software manufacturers such as Nextcloud, OpenCloud, Open-Xchange, Apple, Collabora, OpenTalk, Thomas-Krenn, and the cloud provider STACKIT participated in these workshops.

openDesk, Schleswig-Holstein, and the State of Brandenburg: Examples of Successful Open-Source Implementation

The fact that public administration and the education sector have already made significant strides toward more independent IT systems in some areas was demonstrated by projects such as openDesk, whose roadmap was presented by Alexander Smolianitski, Product Development at ZenDiS.

Sven Thomsen, CIO of Schleswig-Holstein, and Alexander Graefe, Solution Specialist at Dataport, provided insights into the new open-source directory service of the State of Schleswig-Holstein. The service will offer municipal federation, integration of external ID and account providers, as well as context-dependent multi-factor authentication in an open development process.

Pioneering Educational Platform and New Version of UCS

In the Education Track, school authorities presented digitalization projects that they have successfully implemented with Univention. Among other things, the State of Brandenburg showcased its platform- and application-wide identity management system, which, according to Reik Mauermann from the State’s Ministry of Education, has led to a significant increase in the efficiency of user management in the region.

Additionally, the UCS Technology Track introduced new features of Univention products as well as the roadmap for 2025. Key topics included the further development of the Univention IAM solution Nubus for Kubernetes, a more differentiated roles and rights model, and the transition to Keycloak as the identity provider with the new version UCS 5.2, which will be officially released in early February.

Download

Exhibition Area, Univention Summit

Ausstellung Univention Summit

Peter Ganten, CEO Univention

Peter Ganten Univention Summit 2025

Panel Discussion

Podiumsdiskussion Univention Summit

Univention Summit Monsters

Univention Summit 2025 Visual

Lecture Hall, Univention Summit

Vortragssaal Univention Summit

Univention Summit Logo

Univention Summit Logo

More photos from the Univention Summit can be found at: www.univention-summit.com

About Univention

Univention, headquartered in Bremen, is a provider of open source solutions for the efficient management of digital identities and the integration of applications. Openness, scalability and ease of use are central features of Univention products and serve to realize digital sovereignty, which ensures that user organizations have control over their own data and identities as well as the ability to independently design information technology.

The product Nubus bundles central Identity & Access Management, a web portal for easy access to applications and the option of integrating applications via standardized interfaces and integration packages.

Univention Corporate Server (UCS) is an open integration platform that includes Nubus and its own App Center and enables the central management of heterogeneous IT domains. UCS can be operated as a software appliance in your own data center as well as in the cloud.

And the solution UCS@school, which is tailored to the education sector, offers school authorities an optimized platform for the simple provision of services from different providers such as learning management systems, e-mail, cloud and office applications for schools via their own school portals. Users can be imported – also automatically – from national directories and managed centrally.

Univention’s solutions are used by numerous federal states, municipalities and districts, administrations and companies throughout the DACH region.

Use UCS Core Edition for Free!
Download now