Amazon, Microsoft Cloud Services Under EU Competition Probe

BERLIN,

The European Union’s digital regulator, the European Commission, announced on Tuesday that it has launched twin investigations into the cloud services offered by Amazon and Microsoft. The probes aim to assess whether Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft Azure hold sufficient market power to be designated as “gatekeepers” under the stringent new Digital Markets Act (DMA).

Speaking at a summit in Berlin focused on European digital sovereignty, the bloc’s tech chief, Henna Virkkunen, confirmed the move, stating the investigation would determine if the tech giants “should be designated as the gatekeepers on cloud computing.”

The Commission’s statement clarified that the investigation will specifically analyse whether AWS and Azure “act as important gateways between businesses and consumers,” even if they do not strictly meet the standard DMA thresholds for size and user numbers. The EU seeks to conclude these investigations within a year.

Dominance and Outages Prompt Scrutiny

The decision to investigate comes amid growing pressure on Brussels to regulate the US tech dominance in the cloud sector. US providers currently control around two-thirds of the cloud market share within the 27-nation bloc, with AWS leading and Azure closely following. Google Cloud, the third largest provider, is currently not under investigation.

Adding to the regulatory push are recent service disruptions. Both Amazon and Microsoft have experienced widespread cloud outages in recent months, affecting numerous popular services, from streaming platforms to airline check-in systems.

The Digital Markets Act and Future Regulation

The DMA provides the EU with a powerful legal arsenal to ensure fairness in the digital sphere, listing specific “do’s and don’ts” for large technology firms. The law allows the EU to impose fines of up to 10 percent of a company’s total global turnover for non-compliance.

An AWS spokesperson responded to the announcement, arguing that cloud computing is dynamic and competitive. “We’re confident that when the European Commission considers the facts, it will recognise... that designating cloud providers as gatekeepers isn’t worth the risks of stifling invention or raising costs for European companies.”

Separately, the Commission announced a third probe to assess whether the DMA needs updating to ensure it can “effectively tackle practices that may limit competitiveness and fairness” in the EU cloud sector going forward. Both Amazon and Microsoft already face stricter rules for other services, including Amazon Marketplace and Microsoft’s LinkedIn platform.