Digital Transformation (DX) is crucial for industry and public sectors (e.g., power grids, transportation, supply chain, healthcare, agriculture, digital government) given the growing size and distribution of modern infrastructures. Meanwhile, existing DX tends to be a collection of ad-hoc and loose practices with fragmentation: each sector comes up with its own tooling/methods to transform their operations, often by producing point solutions for each setting. Those ad hoc solutions lack formal correctness guarantees and are often a target of cybersecurity attacks. In addition, lacking interoperability across those DX solutions can further lock insights, data, models, and expertise in various silos, and hence fail to address societal challenges for future interconnected industries.

In the meantime, after years of successful centralization of Internet (cloud) computing and services, we are witnessing a new paradigm shift that deserves careful scrutiny: Re-decentralization. Instead of going back to the earlier ‘chaotic’ days of center-less Internet, Re-decentralization represents a new movement to counter the past two decades of centralization, where control power and data have been concentrated in the hands of a few mega-size companies, often referred to as Big Tech. Potential enablers of Re-decentralization have emerged in recent years from computing and networking domains such as edge computing, lightweight virtualization, distributed ledger, federated learning, and IPFS.

The interconnection between Re-decentralization and future DX is substantial but often underestimated. Re-decentralization can contribute to the evolution of DX by providing potential How for many industries looking for strategic principles to mitigate vulnerability and avoid lock-in effects with long-term growth. From a grand perspective, the opportunity behind Re-decentralization comes down to how to restore a balanced and user-empowered architecture for the future computing infrastructures that can meet the growing societal demands for resilience, sustainability, digital sovereignty, and autonomy.

• Dynamics of centralization and decentralization for future computing: To explore the balancing boundary between centralized control and distributed autonomy in emerging digital eco-systems.
• Lessons from the Internet for future digital transformation: To revisit the Internet’s architectural and governance principles for achieving resilient, interoperable, and open digital infra-structures.
• Blind spots, opportunities, and enablers: To identify overlooked challenges and latent opportunities in the intersection of re-decentralization and DX, including new business models, trust mechanisms, and socio-technical requirements.
• Roadmap for the future: To derive a shared vision and research agenda toward sustainable, sovereign, and inclusive digital transformation.

This Dagstuhl Perspectives Workshop aims to explore how re-decentralization can shape the next generation of digital transformation. Building on lessons from the Internet’s evolution, the workshop will identify conceptual foundations, technical enablers, and socio-economic implications of paradigm shifts.

Creative Commons BY 4.0

Aaron Ding, Christian Becker, Jon Crowcroft, and Volker Hilt