soevereine cloud MSP
Why are you as an MSP locked into the hyperscaler?
An MSP is locked into the hyperscaler as soon as clients use native services from Azure, AWS or Google with no portability layer underneath. Research by Proximus Nexus shows only 20% of organisations believe they are not sovereign with their data, while 68% treat sovereignty as a non-issue. The lock-in is no longer a technical problem, it is a business question for the board.
MSP Late Night · 20 August 2026
How do you build an MSP way out without blowing up your business?
Walking away from Microsoft, AWS or Google will not happen in one go over the next five years. What you can do is arrange portability step by step through open source layers such as Kubernetes, and offer clients a sovereign alternative alongside their existing email stack. For governments and sensitive data the American Cloud Act plays a part: as long as an outside party can reach the data, sovereignty is by definition not secured.
What is the real price of lock-in?
DevOps teams allowed to shop freely in hyperscaler services have made portability impossible. Rebuilding costs years and pain, not weeks.
When are you sovereign?
If an outside party can reach the data, you are not sovereign. Average scores on ease of use and price hide that hard floor.
Stay or rebuild as an MSP?
Staying a reseller of existing stacks is fine, but offer a sovereign alternative alongside Copilot. European players are emerging that MSPs can connect to.
If somebody can reach the data, I do not think you are ever sovereign.
Frequently asked questions
What does the American Cloud Act mean for European data in Azure or AWS?
The Cloud Act gives the American government the right to compel American cloud suppliers to hand over data, even when that data physically sits in Europe. For governments and organisations with sensitive citizen data or intellectual property, that means running on Azure, AWS or Google is technically allowed but legally produces no sovereignty. Data access by an outside party cannot be ruled out.
Why do many organisations wait on sovereignty?
Research by Proximus Nexus has around 68% of organisations saying they see sovereignty as a non-subject. Government bodies and large banks are actively working on it, but mid-sized business is waiting for regulation and for mature alternatives. As long as running in the public cloud is allowed, the default choice stays and the problem is pushed into the future.
How does portability between hyperscalers work in practice?
Portability requires an architecture layer above the hyperscaler, usually through Kubernetes and open source components. Anyone weaving native services from AWS, Azure or Google directly into applications loses that portability. The cloud makes switching between regions easy, as appeared when clients in conflict areas could move workloads quickly to other data centres, but switching between hyperscalers is a different story.
Can MSPs develop sovereign technology themselves?
The great majority of MSPs are resellers of existing technology, not developers. Building a European stack yourself is not feasible for nearly any MSP. The practical route is to connect to emerging European players and open source products, and to offer clients a sovereign alternative alongside their existing Microsoft stack. The wider task of building a European technology stack sits with government and industry together.
What should government do differently in tenders?
Current tenders are often written so that only hyperscaler solutions fit, which leaves smaller Dutch and European parties out. If government takes sovereignty seriously, it can make European solutions a hard requirement in tenders. That creates a market by itself that MSPs can become resellers for, comparable to their current position towards Azure or AWS.