January 15, 2026, Today Amazon Web Services (AWS) announced the general availability of AWS European Sovereign Cloud, a new, independent cloud for Europe located entirely within the EU and physically and logically separate from other AWS regions. The AWS European Sovereign Cloud's unique approach provides the only fully-featured, independently operated sovereign cloud backed by strong technical controls, sovereign safeguards, and legal protections designed to meet the needs of European governments and enterprises for sensitive data. AWS also announced plans to expand the AWS European Sovereign Cloud footprint from Germany across the EU to support strict isolation requirements, in-country data storage, and low latency. This will begin with new AWS Sovereign Local Zones in Belgium, the Netherlands, and Portugal.
From day one, AWS's global cloud and AI infrastructure has been built to be superior, giving customers complete control over the location and movement of their data. This is supported by a range of technical measures and operational controls that provide transparency and security, and AWS's global infrastructure that offers exceptionally high levels of resiliency, security, and availability. AWS is built to meet the needs of the most security- and data-protection-conscious organizations in the world., and most customers can meet their requirements using one of the six existing AWS regions in the EU, which are sovereign by design. The AWS European Sovereign Cloud is designed to give customers additional options to meet the EU's stringent sovereignty requirements without compromising AWS' robust capabilities.
AWS European Sovereign Cloud, and the expansion of AWS Local Zones to three additional countries, will provide organizations with additional options for deploying workloads in the cloud with the highest possible sovereignty and operational independence, while maintaining the breadth of AWS services they rely on to innovate and transform their organizations. AWS Local Zones are a type of infrastructure that enables customers to store their data in a specific geographic location to meet data storage requirements or run latency-sensitive applications. They AWS Local Zones announced today will be part of AWS European Sovereign Cloud, extending sovereignty controls from the AWS region in Germany to the entire EU. Customers who have stricter data isolation or data storage requirements will have the option to use AWS Dedicated Local Zones, AWS AI Factories, or AWS Outposts in locations of their choosing, including their own on-premises data centers.
Managed, operated and secured in Europe
AWS European Sovereign Cloud combines comprehensive, layer-based controls to provide a robust solution for customers who need to meet strict digital sovereignty requirements while still benefiting from the breadth of AWS Cloud and AI innovation. Everything needed to run the AWS European Sovereign Cloud is located in the EU: the talent, infrastructure, and leadership. There is no operational control outside of EU borders. Key features include:
- European operational autonomy: The AWS European Sovereign Cloud is physically and logically separate from other AWS regions. It operated exclusively by EU residents, has no critical dependencies on infrastructure outside the EU, and its unique design allows for continued operations indefinitely, even in the event of a communication disruption with the rest of the world. To support continuity even in extreme circumstances, authorized AWS employees in the AWS European Sovereign Cloud who are residents of the EU will, in exceptional cases, have independent access to a copy of the source code needed to maintain the AWS European Sovereign Cloud services.
- Complete data storage: AWS European Sovereign Cloud gives customers full control over where their data is stored. AWS European Sovereign Cloud enables customers to store all metadata they create (such as roles, permissions, resource labels, and configurations) entirely within the EU, including sovereign identity and access management (IAM) systems, billing, and usage metering systems.
- Leading technical and compliance controls: Security is fundamental to digital sovereignty, and like other AWS regions, the AWS European Sovereign Cloud is powered by AWS Nitro System, which provides industry-leading, strong physical and logical security boundaries to enforce access restrictions so that no one, including AWS employees, can access customer data running in Amazon EC2. AWS also provides advanced encryption, key management services and hardware security modules that customers can use to further protect their content. Encrypted content becomes unusable without the appropriate decryption keys. AWS has also introduced AWS European Sovereign Cloud: Sovereignty Reference Framework (ESC-SRF) , an independently validated framework to meet clients' sovereignty requirements. Clients can use the third-party validated ESC-SRF audit report to demonstrate clear and enforceable sovereignty assurances.
- European governance: AWS has established a special governance structure in Europe , with a new parent company and three local subsidiaries formed in Germany (GmbH), led by EU citizens who are required to comply with European laws and act in the best interests of the AWS European Sovereign Cloud. It also includes a advisory board , which will provide expertise and accountability on sovereignty-related issues and is comprised of three Amazon employees and two independent board members, all European citizens and residents.
Today AWS announced that Stefan Hoechbauer, Vice President of AWS Global Sales Germany and Europe Central, has been named CEO of AWS European Sovereign Cloud. He will work closely with Stéphane Israël, who will lead AWS European Sovereign Cloud and be responsible for governance and operations. AWS also announced five new members to its Advisory Board: three Amazon employees – Stéphane Ducable, Vice President of EMEA Public Policy at AWS; Ian McGarry, Head of Amazon CloudWatch; and Barbara Scarafia, Vice President and Deputy General Counsel Europe at Amazon – as well as two independent directors, General (Ret.) Philippe Lavigne and Sinéad McSweeney. General (Ret.) Philippe Lavigne most recently served as NATO’s Supreme Allied Commander Transformation. McSweeney currently serves on a variety of boards and was previously Vice President of Public Policy at Twitter.
Investments in European innovation and digital capacity
- AWS European Sovereign Cloud has launched its first AWS region in Brandenburg, Germany. As part of its long-term commitment Amazon plans to invest more than 7.8 billion euros in the AWS European Sovereign Cloud in Germany and support an average of 2,800 full-time equivalent jobs annually, contributing approximately €17.2 billion to Germany's GDP.
- The expansion of the AWS European Sovereign Cloud to Belgium, the Netherlands, and Portugal represents a further planned investment in new, groundbreaking cloud and AI capabilities that will help support local economic growth, productivity, and innovation. By bringing AWS cloud capabilities closer to customers, AWS gives organizations the tools they need to drive their digital transformation, while meeting stringent data storage and low latency requirements.
- Customers and partners using the AWS European Sovereign Cloud will benefit from the full power of AWS, including the same security, availability, performance, familiar architecture, APIs, and leading security innovations as the AWS Nitro System. The AWS European Sovereign Cloud will initially include more than 90 services across a variety of categories, including artificial intelligence, compute, containers, databases, networking, security, and storage.
- Customers from the public sector and a variety of regulated industries across Europe have already chosen the AWS European Sovereign Cloud. This includes EWE AG, Medizinische Universität Lausitz – Carl Thiem (MUL-CT), Sanoma Learning, and more.
- AWS Partners are committed to providing their solutions for and within the AWS European Sovereign Cloud. Launch partners include: Accenture, adesso, Adobe, Arvato Systems, Atos, Capgemini, Dedalus, Deloitte, Genysys, Kyndryl, Mistral AI, msg group, NVIDIA, SAP, SoftwareOne and many more.
European customers across regulated industries, including government, healthcare, financial services, defense and aerospace, energy, telecommunications and more, can now use AWS European Sovereign Cloud to accelerate their innovation while adhering to their strict compliance and data sovereignty requirements.
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