We’re incredibly excited that The Matrix Conference kicks off tomorrow!
As with the inaugural conference last year, Element is beaming with pride to be the anchor sponsor. It’s a delight to see that The Matrix Conference is even bigger this year, and that the incredible growth of the Matrix universe means that there’s now a whole bunch of other Matrix-based providers who are also sponsoring.
More than 300 people will be in Strasbourg, sharing news, insights and inspiration from all across the world of Matrix. One of the most enjoyable aspects of the conference is seeing the contrasts - and similarities - between huge government deployments, niche public sector solutions and community innovations. It’s a wonderfully diverse mix of people, all rubbing shoulders together and sharing the same passion for sovereign communications.
The conference starts with the welcome party on Wednesday night, jointly sponsored by Element and Rocket.Chat. There’s even joint branded beer mats! The conference then runs through until about 6pm on Saturday; three jam-packed days of Matrix, meetings and mayhem!
The Element sponsored public sector track runs across Thursday and Friday.
Phenomenal presentations about the use of Matrix in the public sector
It really is stunning to see the calibre of those presenting as part of the public sector track. More than 10 governments are attending The Matrix Conference this year, mainly from the EU.
Given Element and Matrix are all about digital sovereignty - a strategic imperative for European governments - it’s so good to see that the European Commission will be sharing its work with Element and Matrix as it strives to bring resilience and sovereignty to its communications, and other institutions across Europe.
Also presenting is Germany’s Centre for Digital Sovereignty (ZenDiS), the driving force behind openDesk, an office and collaboration suite designed specifically for public administration - in which a whitelabelled version of Element is the chat component. Its presentation has a similar pan-European theme as it looks at the need for seamless communications between sovereign workspace solutions used by EU member states. In particular it will cover its work with France and the Netherlands, with the goal of facilitating cross-border collaboration and data exchange while maintaining sovereignty and security.
The French government - whose private Matrix federation for French civil servants, called Tchap, already has 360K monthly active users - will be sharing its plans to widen its federation to connect with other public French Matrix nodes (local authorities for instance) and other European countries. This is very much the vision behind Matrix, and it’s fabulous to see France proactively pushing for Matrix-based communications across European governments.
The German Federal IT Cooperation (FITKO), part of the German IT Planning Council, will present on its plans to consolidate its disparate solutions for government-to-citizen (G2C) and government-to-business (G2B) communications in favour of transitioning to a unified, yet decentralised, Matrix-based infrastructure.
Försäkringskassan, the Swedish Social Insurance Agency that administers Sweden's national social insurance system, will share its latest work on SAFOS, a Matrix-based service designed to establish a potential national standard for secure messaging, video conferencing, and real-time collaboration for use across the Swedish public sector. The presentation will also cover insights from eSam — a voluntary collaboration between public agencies — where a multi-agency task force is evaluating options for a common, open, and federated protocol for real-time communication.
The Luxembourg government will showcase its work to establish a Matrix-based sovereign instant messaging ecosystem for the public and private sector for Luxembourg.
We’re also delighted that the United Nations International Computing Centre (UNICC) is presenting on its use of Element, and its plans to make more use of Matrix-based communications for sovereign and secure messaging for UNICC and its partners.
Having presented last year on its NATO-branded Element app NI2CE Messenger, NATO ACT will present on Matrix-based communications for integrated telemetry and video streams from uncrewed platforms as a part of a demanding operational project in the Baltics.
BWI is the central IT service provider and digitalisation partner for the German Armed Forces (Bundeswehr). Having already worked with Element to create BwMessenger, which is now the standard messenger for the Bundeswehr, BWI will present on BundesMessenger; its Matrix-based solution for the German public sector.
And just to prove it really is a Matrix universe, a joint presentation from the LUNA Luna Analog Facility and the European Space Agency will look at the use of Element and Matrix to provide clinical guidance for a moonwalk emergency. The synopsis begins: “Twenty seconds is a long time when someone can’t breathe,” and without doubt will be standing room only!
And that’s just the public sector track presentations!
TI-Messenger for the German healthcare system
The TI-Messenger track, sponsored by Famedly, brings together a series of presentations based on the German healthcare industry’s adoption of the Matrix-based TI-Messenger standard for sovereign, interoperable and secure communications.
The German national agency responsible for the digitalisation of the healthcare system, gematik, has two presentations. The first explores the underlying structural challenges of the German healthcare system which makes intersectoral communications so difficult, and why Matrix is the ideal protocol for a nationwide communications infrastructure. The second presentation looks at the rollout of Matrix-based communications for 74 million statutorily insured German citizens.
Element regards gematik’s TI-Messenger initiative as one of the most innovative large-scale uses of Matrix to date, and we're delighted to have partnered with T-Systems to create its TI-Messenger solution for BARMER; one of the largest health insurance providers in Germany, with more than eight million customers.
connect2x is sharing its experience of developing and approving a TI-Messenger approved app, and likewise Famedly will cover the development of its TI-Messenger app.
CompuGroup Medical, an international provider of e-health solutions, will cover its development of CGM Messenger, with fascinating insights looking at deep integration into primary systems, the use of headless clients, and tackling challenges around usability, eID identity models, and technical complexity. It also intends to share its vision of a unified European health space — rooted in open standards and coordinated implementation.
More highlights at Matrix Conference
There are loads more presentations to savour, but some that stand out to us are updates on both MatrixRTC and Element Call (with a focus on group calling), the latest on Element X, and a deep dive step-through of ESS Community. A case study on matrix.org migrating to Matrix Authentication Service (MAS) is a potential show stealer, as the presentation gives an overview of moving more than 65 million sessions and 110 million accounts to MAS in just 20 minutes (spoiler: there was some prep work)!
Reflecting much of our own experience and thoughts, connect2x looks at the structural and cultural issues that make it harder for corporate contributors to survive in the ecosystem. It also looks at why fair contribution is tough to enforce, how "Trittbrettfahrer" (free riders) hurt long-term progress, and what we as a community - maintainers, companies, and individuals - can do to shift the dynamic. Whether it's licensing strategies, community governance, or pushing for upstream responsibility, the talk explores the imperfect but necessary mechanisms required to keep Matrix open, but not exploited.
Come join, even from home
The momentum behind Matrix has never been stronger. Governments, NGOs, public sector organisations and open-source innovators are uniting around one mission: making Matrix the standard for sovereign, secure and interoperable communication. And we’re now gathering in Strasbourg to push that further!
This year’s Matrix Conference brings together more than 10 governments, countless public organisations, and participants from 20 countries around the world. To everyone driving Matrix adoption in your organisations - thank you. By spreading the word, you’re helping make sovereign, secure and open communications a reality.
For those who can’t make it to beautiful Strasbourg, you can still join virtually - catch live streams of all the presentations via The Matrix Conference website.
See you in Strasbourg (or online)!
