Across Europe’s digital economy, innovation often moves faster than the systems meant to support it. New tools emerge. Old workflows remain. For Hendrik Hey, that gap is the real problem worth solving. Through MILC, the company he founded after decades in media, Hey is now focused on blockchain infrastructure. What started as a response to broken licensing models in media has grown into a broader effort to build Web3 systems that work inside real businesses, real regulations, and real industries. With new partnerships beginning to take shape, MILC is steadily moving into a wider and more important phase.
Building Web3 for Companies That Actually Operate at Scale
MILC’s defining characteristic is restraint. While much of the Web3 world has been driven by speculation and hype cycles, the company has focused on infrastructure that works inside regulated environments. From its base in Luxembourg, MILC works with enterprises that cannot afford instability or regulatory missteps. These are companies with assets, customers, and long-term exposure. They need systems that operate under European law (and can be integrated into existing workflows) while still being able to unlock the benefits of decentralization.
That focus has shaped MILC’s consulting model. Rather than pitching abstract technology stacks, teams are able to break free from business problems, licensing bottlenecks, cross-border ownership disputes, manual settlement systems that slow revenue, and fragmented data that makes governance difficult. Blockchain becomes relevant only when it removes friction from these realities.
The market timing supports this approach. European blockchain adoption continues to accelerate, with forecasts estimating the region’s blockchain market will exceed $59 billion by 2028. Growth at that scale creates pressure. Companies want exposure to new models of ownership and value transfer, but most lack internal expertise. MILC steps into that role as both architect and translator, mapping decentralized systems onto business logic that executives recognize.
As Hey puts it, “We never built MILC to chase trends. Our work is about giving companies infrastructure they can trust, where decentralization improves operations instead of complicating them.” That restraint is partly why MILC has gained traction with organizations that previously viewed Web3 as a risk rather than an opportunity.
From Media Roots to Digital Infrastructure
MILC’s direction makes more sense in light of its founder’s background. Long before blockchain entered the conversation, Hey built a career around making complex systems accessible. In the late 1990s, he created “Welt der Wunder,” a science and technology television program that reached millions across German-speaking Europe.
Years inside media exposed a recurring problem. Contracts moved slowly. Ownership remained hard to audit. Cross-border collaboration came with friction. When blockchain matured beyond experimentation, Hey saw it less as a trend and more as missing infrastructure.
MILC was founded to address that gap. The company’s early focus on tokenized rights and licensing brought clarity to a part of the media industry long defined by opacity. Over time, the underlying technology proved adaptable far beyond content. The same logic that makes ownership traceable in media also applies to energy, education, and enterprise systems where transparency and settlement matter.
Smart contracts automate processes that used to require layers of approval. Data becomes auditable by design. The company’s value no longer sits in a single product. It sits in repeatable systems that allow organizations to modernize piece by piece instead of all at once.
Energy, IONP, and Signals of What Comes Next
One of the clearest examples of MILC’s expansion beyond media is its work in energy infrastructure through its collaboration with ION Power Grid Association. Energy presents the same structural challenges MILC first encountered in content.
In this partnership, MILC’s blockchain-based infrastructure serves as a system to link producers and consumers through decentralized processes. The IONP token, itself, introduces a programmable layer to the exchange, pricing, and settlement of energy. Instead of using middlemen, users can relate through verifiable systems that work on a large scale.
The energy collaboration also hints at MILC’s broader trajectory. Media may have provided the initial proof point, but the company increasingly positions itself as a cross-industry infrastructure partner. Education, enterprise data systems, and industrial coordination are all areas where similar frameworks apply. Each deployment reinforces the others.
MILC’s story is not about reinvention for its own sake. It is about continuity. The same thinking that once helped audiences understand science on television now helps industries make sense of decentralization. As new partnerships near completion and infrastructure spreads into sectors that rarely share headlines with Web3, the picture becomes clearer. MILC is no longer just helping companies adapt to the future. It is helping define how that future is built, piece by practical piece.
For Hendrik Hey, the idea remains consistent. Complex systems should be understandable. Technology should serve people who rely on it. MILC’s next phase is not about proving Web3’s potential. It is about applying it where it already makes sense, then letting the results speak.
About MILC Hendrik Hey is the Founder of MILC (Media Industry Licensing Content), a pioneering company in the blockchain and metaverse space, with a strong background in media and content. MILC operates a real live metaverse platform that serves not only the media industry but also various industrial use cases. The company also focuses on Web3 consulting, aiming to support complex real-world industries on their way into Web3. MILC is a sister company of European media giant Welt der Wunder, which Hey founded over 25 years ago.