These Four charts show how reliant Europe is on U.S. digital infrastructure

Published Fri, Feb 13 2026

3:30 AM EST

MADRID, SPAIN - NOVEMBER 24: A model of Amazon Web Services (AWS) at the opening ceremony of the business meeting 'Innovation in the cloud as an opportunity for Spain', at the Hotel InterContinental Madrid, on 24 November, 2022 in Madrid, Spain. (Photo By Isabel Infantes/Europa Press via Getty Images)

Europa Press News | Europa Press | Getty Images

Key Points

Europe's reliance on U.S. tech providers for the vast majority of its digital services has come under intense scrutiny as geopolitical tensions have intensified.
U.S. companies control the majority of key markets including cloud computing, enterprise software and CRM platforms in Europe.
CNBC has compiled four charts which show how dependent the continent is on U.S. digital infrastructure.

As geopolitical tensions between the EU and the U.S. escalate, these charts show how reliant the continent is on American tech providers, despite pledges to become more independent.

Since returning to the White House last year, U.S President Donald Trump imposed tariffs on the continent and caused headaches and fear in Europe as he initially refused to rule out military action to acquire Greenland, a semi-autonomous Danish territory, before backtracking.

With the long-standing transatlantic alliance looking uncertain, European governments are increasingly moving to develop digital autonomy. Critics of Europe's reliance on U.S. companies for digital infrastructure warn that U.S. law enforcement can request user data from American companies, regardless of where the data is stored, as part of the Cloud Act.

But tech providers from the other side of the Atlantic still dominate in Europe.

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European cloud providers have been steadily losing ground to U.S. rivals over the past nine years, holding under 15% of the market in 2025, according to data from Synergy Research Group, a market analytics company.

"It will be incredibly difficult for European cloud providers to meaningfully reverse the market share trend," John Dinsdale, the group's chief analyst, told CNBC.

"This is a game of scale. In order to be a leading player, you have to be continually investing large amounts in research, service development, technical infrastructure, customer support and channel partners," he added. "You also have to have the brand recognition and ability to operate globally or at least across multiple geographies."

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Amazon, Microsoft and Google control more than 70% of the European cloud market, while the European companies with the largest share of the market are German duo SAP and Deutsche Telekom, with 2% each, per Synergy data.

"If you were able to go back 10 years and rewrite history, maybe one or two European companies could and should have set out their stall to be a leading player in the cloud market, but they didn't," said Dinsdale.

Amazon gained a huge early mover advantage by acting first in the market, he said, adding that Microsoft and Google followed at a distance. "Oracle eventually got serious about the cloud and is now growing rapidly, and neocloud companies are targeting specific services with some success."

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While SAP commands the biggest share of Europe's enterprise software market, at least 59% is held by U.S companies, according to data from a December report by the European Parliament, with Oracle and Microsoft controlling 18% and 10%, respectively. The enterprise software market data refers to Europe as a whole, including non-EU members such as the UK and Switzerland.

Many political leaders are now "looking at technology in a way to gain sovereignty," SAP CEO Christian Klein told CNBC's "Squawk Box Europe" on Friday, in terms of "not only where do we store the data and how we manage the data, but also how to gain sovereignty on the software side."

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Customer relationship management software is a sector dominated by a single player in Salesforce, with SAP taking second spot, data from the European Parliament report, referring just to the 27 members of the European Union, showed.

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