Levelling The Playing Field for Cloud Services: OMI Welcomes EU Move to Bring Amazon and Microsoft Under DMA Gatekeeper Rules
The Open Markets Institute Europe welcomes today's preliminary decision by the European Commission to designate Amazon and Microsoft as gatekeepers under the Digital Markets Act (DMA) for their cloud computing services, Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft Azure.
"Today's landmark decision is a major step in the right direction for Europe’s competitiveness, resilience and sovereignty,” said Max von Thun, Director of OMI Europe. “Amazon and Microsoft have exploited their dominance in cloud computing to lock in customers, lock out competitors, and extract rents from European businesses and governments. Their grip on this essential infrastructure is not only holding back Europe’s AI ambitions, but it also exposes the continent to unacceptable risks of coercion, disruption and interference by foreign actors. While the DMA cannot fix all these problems, it is a powerful tool that will help Europe build a fairer, more open and resilient cloud market.”
OMI Europe calls on the Commission to confirm its preliminary findings as quickly as possible so that the DMA can begin applying to Amazon and Microsoft’s cloud services. The Commission must also pursue targeted amendments to the DMA’s obligations so that they fully capture Big Tech’s unfair cloud practices, while ensuring that DMA enforcement work in tandem with the Data Act and proposed Cloud and AI Development Act (CADA) (You can read our full recommendations on the DMA’s applicability to cloud and AI here).
OMI Europe also calls on the European Commission to launch an investigation into the potential designation of Google Cloud Platform (GCP) under the DMA. While GCP has a smaller market share in the cloud market than AWS and Azure, the integration of GCP into Google’s broader digital empire enhances the gatekeeper’s power in numerous other markets, including AI, search, video streaming, and digital advertising.
"Applying the DMA to Amazon and Microsoft’s cloud businesses, but not Google’s, risks giving the latter an unfair advantage while doing little to promote genuine alternatives to the Big Three,” von Thun said.
OMI Europe has long argued that dominant cloud providers must be brought within the DMA's framework, pointing to their widely documented use of anti-competitive tactics and the unfair advantages cloud dominance gives Big Tech in AI and other downstream markets.
OMI Europe's February 2026 report Taming the Hyperscalers, authored by Max von Thun and George Colville, set out a detailed blueprint for breaking Big Tech's grip on Europe's cloud infrastructure, including the designation of AWS and Azure and the updating of the DMA’s obligations as central recommendations.