EU Regulators Eye Amazon and Microsoft Cloud Dominance in Europe

European regulators are scrutinizing Amazon and Microsoft's cloud computing dominance in Europe. The European Commission is examining whether Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft Azure provide businesses with a crucial route to reach customers and if switching between providers can be difficult due to established ecosystems and costs.

The review focuses on whether these services give businesses an important route to reach customers and whether switching between providers can be difficult because of established ecosystems and costs. This distinction could bring cloud computing deeper into the EU's Digital Markets Act, which would expose the services to requirements covering interoperability, customer lock-in, and the treatment of rival offerings.

Amazon and Microsoft began facing this review in November 2025, after regulators decided that their scale alone did not meet the law's standard thresholds, but their roles in the cloud market could still warrant oversight. In June, EU officials gave Amazon and Microsoft a preliminary view that AWS and Azure should qualify as gatekeepers.

Regulators are considering whether to act on this designation as soon as November, according to Bloomberg. The Commission's review aims to address the leverage major cloud providers have over customers and ensure fair competition in the market.