Campus Stories: For Inrupt’s Roel Naessens, “Wintercircus Is an Epicenter of Innovation”

World Wide Web inventor Tim Berners-Lee’s new company, Inrupt, has offices in Boston, New York, London and ... Ghent. “We are in the driving seat of the Web of the future,” says Roel Naessens , who keeps that seat warm at Wintercircus.

Roel has just completed a half-hour ride on his brand-new electric bike when he breezes into the Wintercircus Startup Campus. “I bought it to come to work here and not worry about parking,” he chuckles. “Plus, it’s a great excuse for not having yet made it to the Wintercircus gym.”

Like the rest of his team, Roel worked from home until recently. “As Business Director Europe, I’m doing a lot of traveling, so the need for an office wasn’t that great. But we felt we wanted to be part of Wintercircus, and we were also looking for a place for our CEO, John Bruce, to meet with clients and partners. Let’s face it, Wintercircus has much more to offer in that sense than, say, the Marriott.”

With prominent organizations such as NHS, Allstate, BBC, and the British and Flemish governments, Inrupt clients already span sectors such as healthcare, finance, media, and government. And that’s even more impressive if you consider that, according to Roel, there isn’t really a market yet for what Inrupt does, let alone a gap to fill. But the business director seems remarkably unconcerned about that tiny detail: “It’s up to us to create that market. And we already have the zeitgeist going for us.”

Tim Berners-Lee, who co-founded Inrupt in 2018 with John Bruce, did not see “his” World Wide Web move in the right direction. “When he invented the Web at CERN in 1989,” Roel points out, “he envisioned a collaborative ecosystem where control lies with its users. What we see today is that the power lies with a handful of companies, and the user doesn’t even manage his own data.”

That is precisely why Berners-Lee developed a new Web protocol that gives the user more control: Solid. “At first, the web was static,” explains Roel, “then it became interactive, and with Solid, we are moving towards a web that puts people in charge of what they are up to online. Because, on the one hand, the data we leave behind online is incredibly valuable. On the other hand, it is extremely fragmented and difficult to access. So what if you can bring that data together AND under your control?”

Solid was developed by Tim Berners-Lee at MIT with the help of Universiteit Gent professor Ruben Verborgh , among others. The protocol is open source so that anyone can expand on it. And that includes Inrupt, which provides companies and governments with the tools to get started with Solid. Because, make no mistake, companies and governments are also eager to get on board.

“Companies often accumulate a vast amount of data,” says Roel, “but just as often, they don’t know what they are still allowed to do with it. What type of consent has been given for what type of data? With increasingly strict European regulations, many companies find themselves on very thin ice. At the same time, lots of companies are increasingly reluctant to store customer data on their servers because of the security risks that poses. So you can see why banks and insurance companies are interested in our products - they want to comply with regulations and service customers securely. Especially given how easy it’s become to fake IDs with the help of AI.”

In fact, that is also one of the reasons why the EU aims for citizens of all its member states to have a ‘digital identity wallet’ by 2026. “And it is, in turn, why we are now getting lots of requests from governments as well,” Roel admits - enthusiastically.

However, there might also be one more reason. “With the creation of the data utility company Athumi, Flanders can safely be called a pioneer in this field,” Roel explains. “The Flemish government asserted, ‘We have a utility company for water and electricity, so why not create one for data?’ Considering imec and the Flemish universities have since also formed SolidLab Flanders - a research platform that focuses on storing and deploying personal data in the data economy - it’s easy to understand why Ghent is the perfect hub for Inrupt.”

And it’s not just Ghent. The company has no regrets about joining the Wintercircus Startup Campus either. “Not at all! The vibe is incredible, and the Wintercircus Collective is an amazing plus. People genuinely come to its events to network. ‘What do you do? Oh, interesting! Have you met that person yet? No!? Wait, I’ll put you in touch!’ You sense that everyone wants the other companies here to compete at a higher level.”

Incidentally, Roel is a big fan of Wintercircus' hybrid character. “It’s a vibrant place where the most diverse people bump into each other almost effortlessly. I recently went to Ghent Slush’D - a big start-up event - and in the same week, my daughter came here to skate in the Arena to celebrate the tenth anniversary of the Curb Skateshop. I also look forward to discovering bands at Club Wintercircus that are on the verge of bursting onto the global scene, as much as I want to see the startups here expand internationally. To me, Wintercircus is an epicenter of innovation in so many ways.”

Want to know more about the Wintercircus Startup Campus? Visit?wintercircus.be/campus!