Amazon Web Services launches its European Sovereign Cloud, offering EU-only operations, data residency, and full-featured cloud services for regulated industries.
Amazon Web Services has formally opened the AWS European Sovereign Cloud, marking a significant expansion of its cloud infrastructure designed to meet Europe’s most stringent data sovereignty and regulatory requirements. First announced in 2023, the cloud is now generally available to customers across the region.
The launch addresses a long-standing challenge for European public-sector organisations and highly regulated industries, many of which have remained tethered to on-premises systems or limited cloud offerings due to concerns over data residency, governance independence, and operational control.
A Cloud Designed for European Sovereignty
The AWS European Sovereign Cloud is a physically and logically separate cloud infrastructure, operated entirely within the European Union. Its first Region—now live—is located in Brandenburg, Germany, and functions independently from existing AWS Regions. The infrastructure includes multiple Availability Zones with redundant power and networking, allowing continuous operation even during external connectivity disruptions.
AWS plans to expand the sovereign cloud footprint across the EU, beginning with sovereign Local Zones in Belgium, the Netherlands, and Portugal. Customers will also be able to extend the environment using AWS Dedicated Local Zones, AI Factories, and AWS Outposts, including deployments within on-premises data centres.
Governance, Control, and EU-Only Operations
Operational control is central to the sovereign model. The cloud is managed through dedicated European legal entities established under German law and is operated exclusively by EU residents, with a transition underway toward EU-citizen-only operations.
In October 2025, AWS appointed Stéphane Israël as Managing Director of the AWS European Sovereign Cloud, responsible for infrastructure, services, and governance. He is joined by Stefan Hoechbauer, Vice President for Germany and Central Europe at AWS. An independent advisory board composed solely of EU citizens provides additional oversight on sovereignty matters.
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Data Residency and Technical Isolation
The AWS European Sovereign Cloud offers comprehensive data residency assurances. Customer content and metadata—including access roles, permissions, and configurations—remain within the EU unless customers choose otherwise. The infrastructure operates its own identity and billing systems and prevents access from outside the EU through built-in technical controls.
Additional safeguards include a dedicated European trust service provider for certificate authority operations and EU-based DNS infrastructure. AWS states that the sovereign cloud has no critical dependencies on non-EU personnel or infrastructure.
Security, Compliance, and Service Availability
The cloud maintains AWS’s core security capabilities, including encryption, key management, access governance, and the AWS Nitro System for hardware-enforced compute isolation. It undergoes independent third-party audits and supports compliance frameworks such as ISO/IEC 27001, SOC 1/2/3, and Germany’s BSI C5 attestation.
At launch, the platform supports a broad range of services, including Amazon EC2, AWS Lambda, Amazon EKS and ECS, Amazon RDS, Aurora, DynamoDB, Amazon S3, Amazon VPC, AWS KMS, and AI and ML services such as Amazon SageMaker and Amazon Bedrock. A growing ecosystem of partners—including SAP, Adobe, Cisco, GitLab, Snowflake, and others—is making solutions available within the sovereign environment.
Long-Term Investment in Europe
AWS has committed €7.8 billion to support the European Sovereign Cloud through infrastructure development, job creation, and skills training. The company estimates the investment will contribute €17.2 billion to the European economy by 2040 and support approximately 2,800 full-time equivalent jobs annually.
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Availability and Access
The AWS European Sovereign Cloud is available globally to customers who require EU-based sovereignty controls. It operates under the partition name aws-eusc and Region eusc-de-east-1, and supports standard AWS access methods, including the AWS Management Console, SDKs, and CLI.
For European organisations balancing regulatory compliance with innovation, the launch represents AWS’s most comprehensive response to digital sovereignty demands to date.
