Oracle is to launch new sovereign cloud regions to serve customers across the Eur opean Union.
The company announced this week that Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) will launch new sovereign cloud regions for the European Union in 2023.
The first two sovereign cloud regions for the EU will be located in Germany and Spain, and will be logically and physically separate from the existing public OCI Regions in the EU.
Both private companies and public sector organizations will be able to use the new sovereign cloud regions to host data and applications that are sensitive, regulated, or of strategic regional importance.
“These new sovereign cloud regions will operate under a comprehensive set of policies and governance that further enhance OCI’s existing capabilities for data residency, security, privacy, and compliance. These additional policies will establish a framework for data and operational sovereignty, including how customer data is stored and accessed, and how government requests for data are handled,” said Scott Twaddle, VP OCI Product, Industries, and Partners.
Oracle plans to migrate customers using Oracle Fusion Cloud Applications within the existing EU Restricted Access cloud service to the new OCI sovereign cloud regions. Sovereign regions will offer the same services as traditional OCI regions well as the European Union Restricted Access (EURA) application services, at the same pricing as current services.
"With Oracle Cloud Infrastructure’s offerings now in the EU, our options for storing data in a compliant manner could be expanded. As a public sector enterprise within the European Union, the capabilities and features of Oracle’s sovereign cloud regions for the EU could, under the right conditions, be a useful alternative for our organization.”- Richard Wiersema, Director of Operations, DICTU
As a general policy, Oracle said it already does not move customer content from their original regions, but sovereign clouds will extends this practice by restricting operations and customer support responsibilities to EU residents.
Oracle currently has at least one region in each across the UK, France, Switzerland, Italy, the Netherlands, and Germany. A Spanish region is currently in development.
As well as two commercial public cloud regions, the UK has two government-focused regions in London and Newport offering sovereign services. The US has also five government-focused cloud regions; three for the Department of Defence and two general government cloud regions.
Other large cloud providers are looking to offer sovereign cloud services to the EU, but usually through local partners. Google is partnering with Thales and Deutsche Telekom for French and German cloud offerings respectively, while Capgemini and Orange have partnered to resell Microsoft Azure services in France.
The news of new regions comes shortly after The Information reported Oracle was discussing a $1 billion cost-cutting initiative that would include thousands of layoffs.
