Technology major Microsoft has launched public cloud for government customers, offering greater control over their data.
Microsoft expects to use its Cloud for Sovereignty to compete with rivals such as Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Alphabet’s Google.
The size of the global government cloud market is expected to reach $71.2 billion by 2027 from $27.6 billion in 2021, according to market research firm Imarc Group.
The top 5 public cloud service providers are Microsoft, Amazon Web Services, Salesforce, Google, and SAP, according to IDC report.
Microsoft has captured the top position in the public cloud services market with 14.4 percent share in 2021, followed closely by Amazon Web Services with 13.7 percent share.
The worldwide public cloud services market grew 29 percent in 2021 with revenues totaling $408.6 billion.
“We do expect customers around the world..but the first few customers have been in Europe,” said Microsoft corporate vice president Corey Sanders. The company is conducting private previews with customers.
The European Union has been at the forefront of privacy and security legislation and its privacy watchdog launched a probe earlier this year into the public sector’s use of cloud-based services to check if they comply with its privacy safeguards.
Both business and government customers increasingly use the data centres of big tech companies in the form of public clouds rather than building their own infrastructure.
Apart from tech capabilities and lower cost, Microsoft said its cloud product would meet obligations around data governance, security controls, privacy of citizens, data residency and other legal requirements.
Microsoft is working with other local partners to provide tailor-made clouds for local governments. , and Microsoft has signed up Italian defence group Leonardo and Belgian telecoms firm Proximus as partners.
