Niels Claeys

Lead data Engineer | Partner
Data Minded
Belgium

About

I am a Lead Data Engineer at Data Minded with close to 10 years of experience in the data industry. I specialize in building scalable data platforms on AWS, Azure and European clouds and have deep expertise in distributed systems and system architecture. I embracing technical challenges, and see complexity as an opportunity to innovate rather than an obstacle.
Talk

Your cloud strategy after the hyperscaler era

Architecture, EU Sovereignty, Cloud
EU sovereignty is often framed in terms of policy and regulation, yet many organizations are left with a more practical challenge: how do they turn it into something concrete?This talk begins by clarifying what cloud sovereignty actually means: who it applies to, why it matters, and how organizations can approach it strategically. Niels Claeys will outline a pragmatic path, starting from business risks and regulatory requirements, moving through technology stack evaluation and workload identification, and ultimately translating this into a target architecture.To make this tangible, he will explore a range of architectural patterns: from fully on-premises platforms to sovereign control planes in the public cloud, as well as portable workload designs that reduce vendor lock-in. He will also take a realistic look at EU-based cloud providers and what they currently offer as alternatives to hyperscalers.Finally, Niels Claeys will examine the role of open source as a key enabler of sovereignty, showing how it supports transparency, portability, and long-term flexibility. Attendees can expect concrete examples, real-world trade-offs, and actionable insights for teams navigating sovereignty in regulated environments.