Digital sovereignty in action: interview with Sven Thomsen

Governments across Europe have started putting digital sovereignty high on the agenda, but some regions have been paving the way for some time.

The northernmost German federal state, Schleswig-Holstein, has become a leading example of how to regain control over digital infrastructure and adopt an open source approach.

As CIO for Schleswig-Holstein, Sven Thomsen has been a key figure in the state’s digital transformation and collaboration with Nextcloud.

In preparation for his keynote talk at the Nextcloud Summit 2025 in Munich, Germany on June 5th, Nextcloud sat down with Sven, discussing digital sovereignty, his open source strategy, and his vision for a digitally independent Europe by 2030.

Making open source work: the make-or-break factors

Nextcloud: What has been the most critical factor in making Schleswig-Holstein’s transition to open source a success?

Sven Thomsen: It’s quite difficult to isolate one factor out of the multiple key factors. For example, one could name the big political backing of our strategy, the extensive change management, or the amount of strategic planning preceding our ongoing steps for the transition.

But forced to focus on one topic, I’d like to emphasize the actual migration.

If we want to make this journey together with our colleagues, who use our products and, for a substantive part, Nextcloud, we cannot afford to lose them by not supporting the migration of user data and settings.

The change from closed source platforms is a big deal for most of our users. We should make this as easy as possible by providing automated migration of their data.

And — quite frankly — this is an area where most of the open source projects could improve a lot. We need detailed guidelines and implementations regarding the actual migration. Focusing only on installation and configuration is way too short-sighted.

So, only if you ease the actual migration, you really impact the adoption of open source.

How to do digital sovereignty, the right way

Nextcloud: Digital sovereignty is often discussed as a political goal, but what does it truly mean in practical terms for public administrations?

Sven Thomsen: Digital sovereignty can also be used as a cover for “my-country-first” or “not-invented-here”. This quite frankly puts the real intentions for digital sovereignty at risk by focusing on isolation.

Digital sovereignty means quite the opposite.

In our view, digital sovereignty can only be reached by implementing principles of open innovation like inclusive participation, design for reusability or to be open by default.

You’re doing digital sovereignty right, if you follow the United Nations Open Source Principles.

For public administrations, this means fostering an environment of open innovation based on a legal framework promoting open source and open standards.

Why hasn’t everyone made the switch to digital sovereignty yet?

Nextcloud: Why do some governments hesitate to go a similar way as Schleswig Holstein?

Sven Thomsen: Schleswig-Holstein has been following this way for the last 10 years and has focused on “desktop open source” for the last 5 years.

As you can see, implementing open source in a government environment requires extensive planning and preparation. You just cannot simply start implementation projects and be done after 6 months.

Many other organizations in Germany are still in the planning phase or in the first stages of implementation.

Join the conversation at the Nextcloud Summit

Sven will share his experience with digital sovereignty in Europe during his keynote talk at the Nextcloud Summit 2025 in Munich, Germany on June 5th. Don’t miss the opportunity as Sven and other experts on open source, digital policy, and tech innovation come together to shape the future of digital sovereignty in Europe.

Join the Nextcloud Summit 2025

The digital sovereignty revolution starts here. Secure your Early Bird ticket before May 2, 2025.

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