Why sovereign cloud matters more than ever

Our engineers recently gathered to discuss a topic that's becoming increasingly urgent: sovereign cloud infrastructure. Our conversation covered cloud solutions in Europe, the Netherlands' digital independence, and our current reliance on American cloud providers. This blog post shares the key insights from that meeting and outlines our planned next steps.

The Wake-Up Call

Our discussion began with an observation that's hard to ignore: media coverage consistently focuses on the "big three" American cloud providers - Microsoft Azure, Amazon Web Services, and Google Cloud. While these platforms dominate the market, recent geopolitical developments have raised important questions about Europe's digital sovereignty.

The re-election of Donald Trump has introduced new tensions in European-American relations. While the United States remains a valued ally, our almost exclusive dependence on American cloud infrastructure is becoming a point of concern for many organizations and governments across Europe.

A Real-World Example of Digital Dependency

This concern moved from theoretical to concrete when Trump's administration took action against a Chief Prosecutor at the International Criminal Court in The Hague, blocking access to email services. This was possible because the ICC relies on Office 365 - a Microsoft service subject to American jurisdiction and policy decisions.

The incident illustrates a troubling reality: our digital infrastructure can be disrupted by foreign policy disagreements, even when those disagreements don't directly involve us. When an ally can unilaterally disable critical services we depend on, it raises serious questions about our digital autonomy.

Growing Awareness and Concern

We're not alone in recognizing this challenge. The website european-alternatives.eu, launched in December 2024, has seen a significant surge in traffic (as shown in image below), indicating growing interest in European cloud alternatives. Additionally, cybersecurity expert Bert Hubert a former AIVD supervisor and employee - has repeatedly called on the Dutch government to address this digital dependency.

From Politics to Practice: Time to Nerd Out

While geopolitics sparked our initial interest, we're technical people at heart - so we did what we do best: we rolled up our sleeves and started exploring the technical landscape.

Defining Our Cloud Requirements

Since we primarily use Azure (with occasional AWS and Google Cloud deployments), we first needed to identify which functionalities are essential to our operations. Given our DevOps team's focus on Kubernetes, the answer became clearer. Beyond container orchestration, we also rely on Azure Functions and various data services. And lastly our CTO still has that Java applet running weekly for €0.01 per month.

After our discussion, we identified these core cloud platform functions:

• Compute (virtual machines)
• Storage solutions
• Database services
• Networking (public IP addresses, routing, firewalls, load balancing)
• Kubernetes clusters
• Script scheduling

Discovering European Alternatives

Using european-alternatives.eu as our starting point, we found 12 alternative providers listed at the time of writing - a number that continues to grow. Three stood out immediately:

• OVH Cloud: Hosted in France and trusted by the French government, now available to public companies. Their established presence and government backing caught our attention.
• Stackit: Primarily hosted in Germany and owned by the Schwarz Group (which also owns Lidl). Sometimes playfully called "LidlCloud," this platform has serious enterprise backing.
• Cyso Cloud: Based in the Netherlands and formerly known as Fuga Cloud, offering local hosting with familiar regulatory frameworks.

Hands-On Testing: Our Initial Experiments

OVH Cloud: A Promising Start

Our colleague Noud took the lead on testing OVH Cloud's Kubernetes capabilities. The results were encouraging - deploying applications proved straightforward and user-friendly. Using Terraform, he successfully spun up a Kubernetes cluster, leveraging OVH's dedicated Terraform provider to create the necessary resources efficiently.

After deploying a simple nginx application to the cluster, everything worked as expected. The sign-up process was smooth, and deployment times were reasonable. One minor observation: the region naming conventions could be more intuitive, which would simplify initial setup and potential migrations from other providers.

Stackit: Enterprise-Grade Potential

Our colleague Dion began exploring Stackit, though this proved more complex initially. Unlike other providers, Stackit isn't open to the general public - it originated as an internal cloud solution for the Schwarz Group's companies, including Lidl and Kaufland.

Dion connected with Stackit engineers at KubeCon London in April, and we received access just after our session was held. The platform shows significant promise, built on OpenStack for compute, storage, and Kubernetes infrastructure. Their enterprise heritage suggests robust, scalable solutions. We will be testing this soon.

The Script Scheduling Challenge

Our CTO Bouke set himself an interesting challenge: migrating his weekly Java applet from Azure Functions to a European alternative. This seemingly simple task revealed some current limitations in the European cloud ecosystem.

While several alternatives offer script scheduling capabilities, Java support remains limited. Other providers require running scripts within Kubernetes clusters, which significantly increases costs for simple, infrequent tasks. This highlighted a potential path forward: adapting to different programming languages to better align with European providers' current offerings.

Planning Our Next Steps

Based on our initial exploration, we've outlined several concrete next steps:

• Deeper technical evaluation: We're scheduling another session in a few months, with teams assigned to thoroughly test each promising cloud provider. This will give us hands-on experience with real-world workloads.
• Knowledge sharing: We're planning to make our findings public through an open session, sharing our discoveries with the broader technical community and demonstrating what's already available in the European cloud landscape.
• Practical preparation: Rather than advocating for immediate wholesale migration, we're positioning ourselves to support informed decisions when the time comes.

Looking Forward: Realistic Expectations

European cloud providers are undeniably behind the "big three" American companies in terms of feature breadth and ecosystem maturity. However, the services we've examined show genuine promise for core functionalities, and some are already expanding into more specialized areas.

What European providers offer that their American counterparts cannot is something increasingly valuable: native European hosting with built-in compliance to European standards and regulations. This isn't just about data sovereignty - it's about predictable, stable access to critical infrastructure.

The current momentum is encouraging, with interesting developments happening at both the technical and governmental levels. However, we're realistic about the timeline ahead.

Conclusion: Prepared for Multiple Scenarios

We don't expect massive migrations away from American cloud providers in the immediate future. Enterprise migrations require significant time, effort, and planning. Political landscapes change, and many organizations are comfortable with their current solutions.

But as CINQ, we're preparing for various scenarios:

• Customer-driven moves to European cloud solutions
• Regulatory requirements that favor European hosting
• Geopolitical disruptions that affect American cloud access
• Continued reliance on current providers where appropriate

The key is being ready: understanding the landscape, knowing the alternatives, and having the technical expertise to advise and implement when the time comes. Whether that's next year or in five years, we'll be prepared to help our clients navigate whatever the future of cloud infrastructure brings.