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About this Event

If you’ve ever inherited a sprawling web estate and thought, “How did we get here?” this session is for you.Like many large universities, Edinburgh’s digital state had grown incrementally over time, until it no longer supported the institution’s needs. A well-intentioned push for local autonomy created a complex web estate. Pivoting to a strict, one-size-fits-all central model slowed teams down and limited what they could deliver across the university.In this customer-led conversation, Stratos Filalithis (Head of Web Strategy) and Billy Wardrop (Web Development Team Manager) share how The University of Edinburgh shifted away from rigid central control, enabling local autonomy within a coherent institutional framework.Joined by Josh Koenig (Pantheon) and Dr. Christoph Breidert (1xINTERNET), they walk through the real arc of the transformation, exploring how Edinburgh reached a tipping point, aligned stakeholders around a viable platform vision, used Degree Finder (AI powered search tool) to prove a flexible governance model, and built a standardised platform foundation that improved visibility, reduced risk, and became the university’s default web platform.

Agenda

  • The tipping point (and the backstory):
    How The University of Edinburgh moved from a monolithic setup toward a platform vision, driven by a desire to modernise onto a more innovative, future-ready technology stack in response to rising complexity and stakeholder scale.

  • The approach - Freedom Within a Framework:
    How an outside perspective helped The University of Edinburgh build a rigorous business case and blueprint - what they standardised, what stayed flexible, and how they designed governance that scales and lasts.

  • The impact (what changed in practice):
    How they handled high-visibility projects with unique requirements like their Degree Finder without breaking the mold on governance, and how improved visibility, lower customisation, and clearer operating rules helped the new model become the default across the university.

Meet the Presenters

Josh Koenig

Co-Founder, Pantheon

Josh Koenig is the Co-Founder of Pantheon, a WebOps platform that unlocks the full potential of open source CMS for websites. A prominent figure in the WordPress and Drupal communities, Koenig has been a long-time advocate for open source and the open web.

Stratos Filalithis

Head of Web Strategy, The University of Edinburgh

Stratos Filalithis is the Head of Web Strategy at The University of Edinburgh. With more than 15 years of experience in leading web and digital teams, Stratos is currently leading the evolution and maturity of the University’s web governance and oversees the execution of its web strategy.

Billy Wardrop

Web Development Team Manager, The University of Edinburgh

Billy Wardrop is Web Development Team Manager at The University of Edinburgh. With over 10 years leading large scale web projects, he delivered the EdWeb transformation to a decentralised multi-site architecture enabling "controlled freedom" across 150+ sites and 1500 users.

Dr. Christoph Breidert

Co-Founder, 1xInternet

Dr. Christoph Breidert is the Co-Founder of 1xINTERNET, a leading European digital agency specialising in Drupal-based platforms. With over 20 years of experience in digital transformation and open source, he has led more than 200 Drupal projects for organisations building scalable, future-ready web platforms. Christoph is a founding leader of the Drupal AI Initiative, where he helps shape the ethical and provider-agnostic use of AI in Drupal, spanning content creation, accessibility, and compliance.