Some EU countries oppose technological sovereignty from US companies, especially against the backdrop of ongoing tariff negotiations and because of their dependence on the US in other areas, the Financial Times (FT) reported, citing its sources.
“Do we really need to start a new dispute with the US about this right now?“, said an unnamed EU diplomat. According to him, such actions could negatively affect the negotiations on trade tariffs between the community and the United States, and would also affect the “key role of the United States in supporting Ukraine“.
At the same time, the European Union has already started negotiations to include in the legislation a number of protectionist measures that would give an advantage to European companies over American ones, while at the same time respecting agreements with the World Trade Organization (WTO) in the field of public procurement. Among others, the Vice-President of the European Commission (EC) Stephane Séjournay advocates this approach. According to him, support for European companies in the field of public procurement could be “the first step“. "In the field of technology, we (the European Union) are very dependent on the Americans," he stressed.
In turn, American technology companies are strengthening their presence in the European market. Amazon announced the so-called Sovereign Cloud storage, which will allow the storage and rapid control of data within certain regions. The technology giant Microsoft, for its part, will be ready to go to court to "protect the access of European customers to its services."