Magazine
Cloud Storage
Object Storage

Mastering Digital Sovereignty: A 2025 Guide to Enterprise-Grade Object Storage

24.09.2025

9

Minutes
Christian Kaul
CEO Impossible Cloud
How European businesses can leverage S3-compatible object storage for compliance, resilience, and predictable costs without vendor lock-in.

In 2025, European IT leaders face a critical challenge: balancing cloud adoption with the absolute need for digital sovereignty. A majority of EU decision-makers now prioritize European solutions for their data infrastructure. Yet, concerns over performance, hidden costs like egress fees, and the risk of vendor lock-in slow progress. Enterprise-grade S3-compatible object storage, built on a foundation of EU legal certainty, offers a clear path forward. It addresses the core pains of cost unpredictability and regulatory exposure, providing a resilient, scalable, and sovereign platform for critical workloads like backup, archiving, and ransomware protection.

Schlüsselpunkte

  • True digital sovereignty is achieved by using EU-based object storage that guarantees data residency and eliminates exposure to foreign laws like the CLOUD Act.
  • An "Always-Hot" storage architecture with full S3 compatibility provides immediate data access and predictable performance, avoiding the hidden costs and delays of complex tiering.
  • A predictable pricing model with zero egress or API fees is critical for enterprises and MSPs to control costs and build profitable, scalable services.

Secure Digital Sovereignty by Design

A strong majority of EU businesses now demand European solutions for their critical data infrastructure. Our object storage is operated exclusively in certified European data centers, ensuring full GDPR compliance. This architecture provides country-level geofencing to guarantee data residency under strict EU rules. We eliminate exposure to foreign regulations like the CLOUD Act. This approach transforms regulatory readiness into a competitive advantage for over 46% of firms that see compliance as a top factor. This foundation of sovereignty is the first step toward a resilient data strategy.

Achieve Full S3 Compatibility Without Compromise

True enterprise readiness demands more than basic API support for object storage. Our platform ensures full S3-API compatibility, protecting your investment in existing tools and scripts. This allows for seamless integration with leading backup software, including our collaboration with NovaBackup. We support advanced capabilities like versioning and lifecycle management across 100% of our API. This prevents costly code rewrites and minimizes migration risk. A cloud storage solution must simplify, not complicate, your existing workflows. This compatibility ensures your operations continue without interruption.

Build Resilience with an Always-Hot Architecture

Complex data tiering introduces risk, delays, and surprise costs during critical restore operations. Our object storage utilizes an "Always-Hot" model, ensuring all data is immediately accessible with predictable latencies. This design eliminates single points of failure and avoids the 24-hour or longer delays common with archived tiers. This model reduces operational complexity for 100% of your data. It is ideal for mixed workloads, from millions of small files to petabyte-scale archives. Here is how this architecture strengthens your data posture:

  • Instant Access: All objects are available for immediate read/write operations, crucial for disaster recovery scenarios.
  • Predictable Performance: Consistent latencies support demanding applications and analytics without API timeouts.
  • Simplified Management: Eliminates the need for complex lifecycle policies to move data between tiers, reducing configuration drift by 100%.
  • Cost Transparency: A single, simple storage model means no unexpected fees for data retrieval or tier changes.

This robust foundation is essential for protecting against modern threats, including ransomware. A proper cloud backup storage strategy depends on this instant accessibility.

Implement Advanced Ransomware Protection

Ransomware attacks now target backup files to prevent recovery, making immutable storage a necessity. Our object storage includes Immutable Storage with S3 Object Lock, creating a write-once-read-many (WORM) state. This feature prevents any object version from being deleted or overwritten for a customer-defined period. This makes your backups tamper-proof against malicious encryption attempts. It provides a guaranteed clean recovery point for 100% of protected objects. This capability is a cornerstone of a modern 3-2-1 or 4-2-2 backup strategy. An immutable backup is your last line of defense. This proactive security measure is critical for maintaining business continuity.

Navigate 2025 EU Regulations with Confidence

The European regulatory landscape is evolving rapidly, with at least two major regulations taking effect in 2025. Our sovereign object storage is designed to meet these future challenges today. We provide the tools to align with these key directives:

  1. EU Data Act (September 2025): This regulation mandates data portability and interoperability to prevent vendor lock-in. Our use of open standards ensures you can migrate all data, including metadata and versions, at any time.
  2. NIS-2 Directive (enforced through 2025): This requires continuous security processes for critical infrastructure, including supply-chain assurance and incident reporting within 72 hours. Our operations are built around these principles.
  3. GDPR Compliance: We ensure all data processing adheres to GDPR's strict requirements for data subject rights and lawful processing, backed by a Data Processing Agreement (DPA).

Our platform provides verifiable compliance with EU-controlled key management. This focus on regulatory alignment ensures your data strategy remains viable for years to come.

Realize Predictable Economics and Partner Value

Unpredictable cloud bills, driven by hidden egress and API call fees, can destroy IT budgets. Egress fees alone can account for over 10% of a total cloud bill. Our pricing model is predictable by design, with zero egress fees, no API call costs, and no minimum storage duration. This transparency allows for 100% predictable margins for our MSP partners. For resellers and system integrators, our multi-tenant partner console simplifies management with features like RBAC and MFA. With distribution partners like api (Germany) and Northamber plc (UK), we are expanding local access across Europe. This economic clarity empowers partners to build profitable and compliant BaaS and archiving services.

Execute a Seamless Migration Strategy

Transitioning to a new object storage provider should not require a complete overhaul of your infrastructure. Our full S3 compatibility ensures a straightforward migration process with zero code changes. You can continue using your existing S3-native tools, SDKs, and applications immediately. A typical migration can be completed up to 50% faster than with non-S3-compatible systems. To ensure a successful transition, follow these three key steps:

  1. Configure Your Tools: Update the endpoint URL and credentials in your existing S3-compatible applications or backup software.
  2. Replicate Policies: Re-create your bucket policies, IAM roles, and lifecycle rules in our console.
  3. Test and Validate: Perform a test data transfer and, most importantly, a test restore to validate the end-to-end workflow.

This simple process protects your past investments and minimizes any risk to your ongoing operations. For a detailed consultation on your specific use case, talk to one of our experts.

FAQ

What makes your object storage sovereign by design?

Our object storage is sovereign by design because we are a European company that operates exclusively in certified EU data centers. We provide country-level geofencing to ensure your data stays within a predefined region, fully compliant with GDPR and shielded from non-EU regulations.


Are there any hidden costs I should be aware of?

No. Our pricing model is completely transparent and predictable. We have zero egress fees, no charges for API calls (PUT, GET, LIST requests), and no minimum storage duration fees. You only pay for the storage you use.


How does your S3 compatibility help my business?

Our full S3 API compatibility means you can use your existing applications, scripts, and backup tools without any changes. This protects your technology investments, simplifies migration, and eliminates the risk and cost associated with re-writing code for a new platform.


Can I use your object storage for my Veeam or other backup software?

Yes, our object storage is fully compatible with leading backup software providers. It serves as an ideal backup target, especially for creating immutable, off-site copies of your data for ransomware protection and long-term archiving.


How does the 'Always-Hot' architecture benefit me?

The 'Always-Hot' model ensures all your data is instantly accessible, which is critical for fast disaster recovery. It eliminates the delays and retrieval fees associated with tiered storage (cold/archive tiers), simplifying your operations and guaranteeing predictable performance.


How do you support MSPs and channel partners?

We provide a multi-tenant partner console with robust IAM, MFA, and RBAC features. Our predictable pricing model with no egress fees allows partners to build services with stable, defensible margins. We also offer support through our distribution network, including api in Germany and Northamber plc in the UK.


Would you like more information?

Send us a message and our experts will get back to you shortly.