“We see security as a strategic core capability”
As a specialist in building tailored data platforms for large enterprises, cybersecurity is inseparable from Klarrio’s day-to-day reality. “We’ve been around since 2016, and we’ve always regarded our years of experience as a key competitive differentiator,” Vermeylen explains. Across Klarrio’s customer base, he generally sees a solid level of cybersecurity knowledge and maturity. “That’s typical of large organisations today. And yet even within this group, it’s still too often treated as an afterthought. By contrast, we see security as a strategic core capability. It’s a mistake to frame it as a purely technical specialty, and we’re working to raise awareness around that perspective.”
This shift is reflected in the growing focus on data sovereignty, for example. “From day one, we’ve taken a cloud-agnostic approach. In practice, that means our systems can run on any cloud provider or on-premises at the customer’s site. Today that may sound like a given, but a few years ago it wasn’t. Back then, there was far less reason to be critical of the large US-based hyperscalers. However, the current geopolitical tensions have made our position all the more relevant.”
In other words, Klarrio wants to help drive a broader cultural shift in how cybersecurity is approached. “As systems become more interconnected and attack structures more complex, this is increasingly a collective challenge: one you can’t tackle in isolation,” says Vermeylen, pointing to the importance of knowledge sharing and partnerships. “That’s why joining the Coalition felt like a natural step for us.”
And it’s a step that delivered immediate value. “One of the first things I did as a member was attend the BE-CYBER event at the end of last year, where I saw a presentation on post-quantum safe encryption. The message was clear: in high-risk environments, you must be prepared to face this threat by 2030. To meet that deadline, you need to lay the groundwork this year. That’s a timeline we fully support, and one we believe is technologically achievable, thanks to the major progress made in this area over the last year.”
But while this should be a key priority for many organisations in 2026, it hasn’t gained much traction in practice yet. “There’s still too little awareness of what’s coming. Part of that, of course, is down to dealing with existing challenges -— compliance, for example — that already take up a lot of attention. So here too, we’ll need to actively work on raising awareness. As part of the Coalition, which has already published a very useful white paper on the topic, we have more leverage to help move this conversation forward,” Vermeylen concludes.
