Does Europe really control its own digital infrastructure? In this webinar, Fedir Kompaniiets, CEO and co-founder of Gart Solutions, walks through the risks of depending on US hyperscalers, where the US CLOUD Act clashes with GDPR, what “sovereign cloud” means in practice, and how European providers compare. It ends with a practical action map for regaining control.
Published: 4 February 2026
Who it is for: C-level executives, CTOs, CISOs and public-sector leaders deciding where regulated data and workloads should live.
Key takeaways
- Hosting data in an EU region of a US-owned cloud does not remove exposure to US law: the parent company can still be compelled under the CLOUD Act.
- Sovereignty is not isolation. It is the ability to make independent decisions about infrastructure, software and data under EU rules.
- AWS European Sovereign Cloud is a significant operational step, but it remains a legal grey area while the parent company is a US entity.
- A real SaaS case for the manufacturing sector chose Hetzner over a hyperscaler to meet EU data rules, cut bandwidth costs and keep an open-source, portable stack.
- The action map: diversify your cloud stack, classify workloads by sensitivity, keep data portable with containers and infrastructure as code, and build or partner with skilled teams.
- The first step is an audit: where your data is stored, who can access it technically and legally, and whether you have an exit strategy.
Timestamps
- 0:00 Introduction: does Europe control its digital infrastructure?
- 1:07 How much of Europe’s data sits with US providers
- 2:11 What tech sovereignty actually means
- 3:17 Four risks of over-dependence on US providers
- 4:24 Case studies: when cloud control becomes a strategic risk
- 6:34 US law vs EU law: the CLOUD Act and GDPR
- 7:42 Cloud adoption and market growth in Europe
- 9:52 AI, GPUs and cloud dependency
- 12:01 What a sovereign cloud means in the EU
- 13:07 European providers: OVHcloud, Hetzner, Scaleway, T-Systems, Orange
- 14:12 Is AWS European Sovereign Cloud truly sovereign?
- 16:21 Why smaller European providers still matter
- 18:34 Comparing providers: the factors businesses overlook
- 20:40 Case study: a manufacturing SaaS platform chooses Hetzner
- 23:54 Balancing collaboration and autonomy: risk, regulation, maturity
- 27:11 The four-step action map
- 31:28 The big picture: resilience, not isolation
- 34:39 Where to start: audit your data and access
Speakers
Fedir Kompaniiets, CEO and Co-founder, Gart Solutions
Related resources
- Digital Sovereignty in Europe: Sovereign Cloud Requirements and EU Providers
- Cloud independence: when it makes business sense
- Digital Sovereignty Readiness & EU Cloud Assessment Guide (PDF)
- Cloud migration services
Want to discuss how this applies to your infrastructure?
Talk to our team, or browse all Gart Solutions webinars.
