No, Europe’s biggest IT services company Capgemini does not agree with calls of total technological sovereignty in Europe. Paris-based Capgemini CEO Aiman Ezzat has reportedly dismissed calls for a total technological sovereignty in Europe. His comments come at a time when there are calls from several governments across America to reduce dependance on US technology companies in the backdrop of tense transatlantic relations. These frayed relations have stoked concerns about the Europe’s dependence on American tech majors. European Union leaders gathered last week for a summit in Belgium focused on how to increase European competitiveness in a more volatile global economy. Europe’s push for greater digital sovereignty has gained new momentum in recent months, sparked by fears that the US President Donald Trump’s foreign policy could force a “tech decoupling”. Under President Trump, Brussels and Washington have clashed at a number of occasions over the EU’s digital regulation. So much so that, US even banned entry of several current and former EU officials. For those unaware, calls for digital sovereignty in Europe emphasize achieving strategic independence from foreign technology, specifically reducing dependence on U.S.-based tech giants for infrastructure, cloud services, and AI.
Capgemini CEO on full European tech autonomy
According to a report in Reuters, French tech major Capgemini, which serves government agencies, critical-infrastructure operators and large regulated enterprises, is positioning itself as a bridge between Brussels’ sovereignty ambitions and the reality of US-dominated cloud infrastructure. “There is no such thing as absolute sovereignty,” Ezzat told journalists in a post-earnings call. “Nobody has it, because no one has sovereignty over the entire value chain required to deliver services.“Ezzat said that on the first three levels, Europe already has independence, but the dominance of the US Big Tech means that there is no complete independence on a technological level. He believes that rather than pursue full autonomy, European countries should be seeking “the right sovereignty solution based on the use case, the client environment, the government”. He said digital autonomy follows a four-layer framework of data, operations, regulation and technology. Capgemini has signed partnerships US hyperscalers including Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud and Microsoft to deliver what it calls “sovereign” AI solutions, cloud services provided by a European-based company while running on American infrastructure.
EU-US tensions over Greenland add to trade woes
Trump’s threats over Greenland have worsened the trade relations between the US and EU. This has also reignited calls in Europe to hit Silicon Valley with retaliatory measures had the US president followed through, especially as Europe has a large deficit with the US in services. The EU should not be lulled into a false sense of security that tensions with the US over Greenland, technology and trade are over, French President Emmanuel Macron has warned, as he called on the bloc to embark on an “economic revolution” and finally become a true global power. The French President Emmanuel Macron has been a long-standing advocate of more digital sovereignty. He said this week that further clashes between the EU and US over tech regulation were likely later this year.
