Microsoft has pledged to increase its data center capacity in Europe by 40 percent over the next two years.
The investment was announced in a blog post by company president Brad Smith, which was focused on reassuring customers on the continent that moves by the US administration would not impact its services or their security.
Local cloud providers have pointed to the White House's attacks on NATO, tariffs on the EU, and threats to invade Greenland as justification for moving off of US hyperscalers and onto local platforms.
"Given recent geopolitical volatility, we recognize that European governments likely will consider additional options," Smith said, sidestepping what was behind the volatility. "Some of these may involve public financing to support European home-grown offerings. We recognize the importance of a diversified technology ecosystem, and we are committed to collaborating with European participants across the tech ecosystem."
Smith reiterated that the company follows European laws, and that customers can control where their data is stored and processed, how it is encrypted and secured, and when Microsoft can access it.
He added: "Going forward, our European data center operations and their boards will be overseen by a European board of directors that consists exclusively of European nationals and operates under European law."
Smith continued: "In the unlikely event we are ever ordered by any government anywhere in the world to suspend or cease cloud operations in Europe, we are committing that Microsoft will promptly and vigorously contest such a measure using all legal avenues available, including by pursuing litigation in court. By including a new European Digital Resilience Commitment in all of our contracts with European national governments and the European Commission, we will make this commitment legally binding on Microsoft Corporation and all its subsidiaries."
Moving forward, Microsoft plans to "designate and rely upon European partners with contingency arrangements for operational continuity in the unlikely event Microsoft were ever required by a court to suspend services," he said.
"We are already enabling our partners in France and Germany to do this for the Bleu and Delos data centers, and we will pursue arrangements for our public cloud data centers in Europe. We will store back-up copies of our code in a secure repository in Switzerland, and we will provide our European partners with the legal rights needed to access and use this code if needed for this purpose."
Microsoft has also appointed a Deputy CISO for Europe, and would talk to European customers about what else it could do to reassure them.
On the facility side, Smith said that the company is expanding its data center operations in 16 European countries. "When combined with our recent construction, the plans we’re announcing today will more than double our European data center capacity between 2023 and 2027," he said. "It will result in cloud operations in more than 200 data centers across the continent."
He added: "Microsoft is investing tens of billions of dollars annually in expanding its data centers across Europe. These investments aren’t on wheels. They are permanent structures and subject to local laws, regulations, and governments."
Speaking of governments, but without saying which he was talking about, Smith said: "We will always strive to be a voice of reason that promotes mutual opportunities and stable ties across the Atlantic."
