GAIA-X, Europe's attempt to reclaim cloud computing sovereignty against fast-growing hyperscalers from outside the continent, will need to prove that it is worthwhile in the next few months if it wants to avoid an embarrassing descent into irrelevance, according to a new report from analysis firm Forrester.
As AWS, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud continue to expand the reach of their services, the European cloud project will have to show that it can provide more value to CIOs than the average infrastructure provider. If GAIA-X fails to do so by mid-2021, says the report, the initiative will be "dead on arrival" into the market.
Launched only last June, GAIA-X is an ambitious initiative led primarily by ministers from France and Germany, who are determined to create a cloud Ecosystem protected by EU data laws. The idea is to create a marketplace of cloud services that any cloud supplier can join, provided that they stick to the rules – and in true European fashion, those rules focus on data protection and transparency.
At the heart of the project is interoperability. GAIA-X, through unified standards and certifications, aims to make it easier for users to securely exchange data across industries, by linking up different cloud services from European and non-European companies in a single system.
The push to build GAIA-X was largely motivated by a desire to reduce Europe's dependence on foreign cloud providers. Forrester's report shows that non-European hyperscalers control the majority of the market on the continent, with more than half of decision-makers using AWS, Microsoft Azure, IBM Cloud or Google Cloud.
Relying on cloud providers from across the Atlantic comes with some privacy concerns. One particular point of contention is the Clarifying Lawful Overseas Use of Data (CLOUD) Act, which allows US authorities to require access to the data hosted by US storage providers, even if that data is located overseas. In Europe, the birthplace of the GDPR, the CLOUD Act isn't going down all that well.
The GAIA-X project was pitched by EU Commissioner Thierry Breton as a way "to take our destiny in our own hands", and launched earlier this year with the aim of demonstrating usable capabilities by Q1 2021. The deadline is now nearing, but the project still doesn't have much to show for itself.
"By this stage, if they were going to hit their timeframe for Q1 2021, you'd expect there to be a lot more finished definitions of technical standards and demonstrated use cases," Forrester analyst Paul McKay, who authored the report, tells ZDNet. "For example, they outlined that there would be reliance on a cloud security certification scheme, and there haven't been any details around that. Yet that is quite a key anchor thing."
It's not all doom and gloom.
