Sincerely, someone in Canada who did this.
The problem is firing someone in Germany, which can be pretty difficult once a company exceeds 5/10 employees. You basically need either cause (e.g. sabotage, theft, other criminal activity) or the company needs to be in dire economic situations.
To compete, other countries need their own VC system which is a bit tricky. It requires likely a level of government funding or other incentives to get it off the ground and ramping up. Then also, you need to incentivize VCs to stay in your country.
At least my 2cents.
Here in Europe the best credit rating is for the person who's never needed a loan or credit before. It proves they're smart with money. But US citizens have to roll money between credit cards monthly.
The VC in the US mainly existed because interest was so low that money was easy to throw around and see if it stuck. That's no longer the case but these companies are from the time it was.
I don't think we should try to become another America. We don't want unconstrained ratrace capitalism here. And we can never out-US the US (even though China does manage to do that). We should just make alternatives in our own way. Solid with good foundations, play the game by our rules not someone else's.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43465403
But there _is_ also an attitude difference. In terms of willingness to take risks and innovate, the USA does do very well for itself, and I think the UK does ok too. But that cannot be said for the EU countries I’ve lived in. Stable reliable long term safe jobs seem to be more the name of the game, and starting a company is seen as a big and risky commitment. Whereas in the US and UK you can start a company in your lunch break.
It is a generalisation, and I’m part of a wonderful entrepreneurial community here in Munich. But even there everyone says how risk averse European businesses are. I really really wish it wasn’t true.
That said, being fully European doesn't guarantee anything either. They'll just bribe some employees or use an allied intelligence agency within the EU.
Actually, it is. It will operate as a subsidiary company based in Europe. That means it's 100% subject to European law, not American law. And being staffed by Europeans means they are immune to any US legal threats. I.e. the US can't compel a European employee to reveal data under a subpoena the way it could compel American citizens.
Amazon remains the owner and controls the technology, yes. But as long as things are encrypted correctly and the hardware is in Europe, the data is secure from the US government. Sure Amazon or any cloud provider could build a back door, but that will eventually be discovered whether by hacker or whistleblower and their reputation will be forever ruined and they'll lose all corporate and government business forever. It's not in Amazon's corporate self-interest to allow a back door like that.
The only way this would work is if the European operation were truly independent & separately owned, no corporate control from the US. But I don't think that's what AWS is proposing.
(Before hitting ‘add comment’ I’m taking a moment to consider if I’m being overly cynical. But no, I really don’t think I am. But my company does compete with AWS, so that is a bias.)
It would be a dumb move though because they need a worldwide CDN for customers from other countries outside the EU too.
Appeasing a nationalists appetite is impossible.
https://www.theregister.com/2025/07/25/microsoft_admits_it_c...
I'm wondering if someone could sue them for "deceptive marketing statement" under European law.
Sadly a lot of company will pretend to believe the marketing of aws to have an excuse to use aws and pretend to be using a safe sovereign cloud.
Also, I have doubt that the European employees and entities with all access and review to source code, and everything. It will probably be European technician running black box servers in an European data center.
and pay a premium for the pleasure of course
timrogers•55m ago
> the AWS European Sovereign Cloud is operated only by personnel who are European Union (EU) residents located in the EU, subject to EU law.
anon191928•52m ago
blitzar•31m ago
Always was. Its telling that they think that they were not previously subject to EU laws when their EU subsidiary did business with someone located in the EU.
mschuster91•18m ago
The key thing is, at the moment US staff can do admin actions (e.g. SSH into physical hosts). Under this new framework, they can't.