What do French cloud providers think about future Bleu and S3NS offerings?
“I do not see that you are sovereign!“, Quentin Adam, CEO of Clever Cloud, said about “Bleu” and “S3NS”, joint ventures founded by Microsoft, Orange and Capgemini on the one hand and Thales and Google Cloud on the other.
A deadline for 2024
These joint ventures, whose launch has been announced, promise to market offerings labeled “SecNumCloud” for Bleu in 2024 and more specifically for S3NS in the second half of 2024. This timeframe is widely criticized. “Mask falling: Promise of confidence, overselling in 2021, will remain an illusion for a long time to come“, wrote Scaleway General Manager Ian Lechelle, in an email exchange with L’Usine Digitale.
“There are many ‘ifs’Quentin Adam notes. There is a high risk of non-performance of the offer.“In fact, these companies are betting on obtaining a security visa from the National Agency for the Security of Information Systems (Anssi) in a relatively short period of time. However, this label is particularly demanding, recalls David Chasan, director of strategy. 3DS Outscale, Dassault Systèmes. ’s cloud subsidiary, which is already certified.”There is a lot of arrogance in saying ‘we will be SecNumCloud’He judges. You can’t buy it from a supermarket shelf! Keeping data in a data center in France is not enough.“
Same response from OVHCloud, which also has Security Visa. “Compared to our experience, boasting about getting a certification that requires considerable effort and investment in the long run is a bit presumptuous.A company spokesperson said.On our part, at least, it has taken us about two years since we decided to invest in these solutions“, he added.
To choose the company?
Now it’s a matter of choice for 3DS Outscale’s David Chasan. “IT decision makers can make a responsible choice. Where a Leclerc plays on the proximity of its suppliers for food, it can also play on the proximity of digital technology available in the terrain.“, he notes. A reference not chosen by chance, E.Leclerc is a customer of Google Cloud.
“Sovereignty is not only a question of cyber security, but also a question of markets“, analyzed Quentin Adam of Clever Cloud for his piece.Do we really want to trash an entire economic sector that doubles in size every year?“, he marveled. Note that today American providers – Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud Platform – are well ahead of European and French players in the French cloud market.
According to a study by Synergy Research Group, they alone occupy 69% of the European market, the results of which were published on September 21, 2021. Among European players, Deutsche Telekom leads with 2% of the market share. . Companies like OVHCloud and Orange follow the Germans, but their market share falls between the first quarter of 2017 and the second quarter of 2021.
An opportunity to bring together the French and European ecosystems
However, for David Chassan, the French ecosystem “No need to blush“. The complete opposite.”We are just as efficient or more with the same price as AWS“, he says. For OVHCloud, this is the perfect opportunity to integrate the ecosystem on a European scale “Show that there are relevant, accessible and already available solutions” That’s when Bleu and S3NS received the famous mole from the National Agency for the Security of Information Systems (ANSSI).
Quentin Adam admits it’s also a question of political will. “Indeed, it lacks some political fervor, He replied. If we want to be a tech industry in Europe, it needs to be supported and better stop celebrating information that is not good news.“
Proposals that meet official doctrine
In fact, let’s not forget that future Franco-American proposals respond to the “cloud in the center” doctrine, which was presented by the government last year. It offers the possibility of “hybrid offers” to be compatible with “Trusted Cloud”, a security label that includes compliance with the SecNumCloud repository.
“The Service may be licensed By companies around the world Thus allowing French companies and administrations to benefit from the most innovative services“, we can read on the site of the Interministerial Digital Department (DINAM). These solutions must find their infrastructure and manage their systems in Europe. In addition, the operational and commercial porting of the offer must be provided by an entity owned by European European players.
So it remains to be seen whether Anssi will approve these offers. The latter will also have to meet the requirements of the future European cloud certification scheme, which will be adopted by the European Network and Information Security Agency (ENISA). A “higher” level should include an obligation of immunity from foreign law. “All this must be preserved even if the Americans are already maneuvering to subvert this initiative“, notes David Chasan.
