Magazine
Cloud Storage
Object Storage

Secure Digital Sovereignty: A Superior S3-Alternative to the Azure Object Storage API

18.09.2025

10

Minutes
Christian Kaul
Founder & COO Impossible Cloud
How European enterprises can eliminate egress fees and meet EU compliance mandates with a predictable, S3-compatible object storage platform built for resilience.

Many EU companies feel trapped by hyperscaler pricing models, where over 56% report exceeding their cloud storage budgets. Hidden egress fees and API call charges create financial uncertainty, while exposure to non-EU laws like the CLOUD Act challenges GDPR compliance. The market needs a sovereign, predictable, and fully compatible solution. Impossible Cloud provides an enterprise-grade, S3-compatible object storage platform operated exclusively from European data centers, offering a clear path to cost control and digital sovereignty without sacrificing performance.

Key Takeaways

  • Impossible Cloud offers a European, S3-compatible object storage solution that provides an enterprise-ready alternative to the Azure object storage API, focusing on digital sovereignty.
  • The platform eliminates unpredictable costs with a transparent model featuring zero egress fees, no API call charges, and no minimum storage durations.
  • It is designed for compliance with EU regulations like GDPR, the EU Data Act, and NIS-2 by operating exclusively in EU data centers and keeping data outside the reach of the US CLOUD Act.

Exceed S3 API Standards for Seamless Integration

True compatibility protects your technology investments of the last 10 years. Our platform supports advanced S3 API capabilities like versioning and lifecycle management. This ensures your existing applications and scripts continue to work without a single code rewrite. We guarantee 100% API consistency across all endpoints. The S3 API has become the de-facto standard for object storage, ensuring maximum interoperability. This deep S3 compatibility minimizes migration risk and preserves your operational workflows. Your transition to a sovereign cloud environment can be completed in just one afternoon.

This architectural commitment ensures your tools and teams remain productive from day one.

Leverage an Always-Hot Architecture for Consistent Access

Complex tiering models create unpredictable delays and increase operational costs by over 30%. Our “Always-Hot” object storage model ensures all data is immediately accessible, eliminating restore fees and API timeouts. This architecture provides strong read/write consistency and predictable latencies for millions of objects. Every byte of your data is always online and ready for access. This approach avoids the fragile lifecycle policies that cause application failures. It provides a stable foundation for everything from backup and recovery to analytics workloads.

Predictable performance is only one part of the equation; robust identity management is also essential.

Implement Granular IAM Aligned with EU Governance

Effective governance requires tools that map to your organization's structure. We provide identity-based IAM with granular, role-driven policies and secure defaults. Support for external identity providers via SAML/OIDC is integrated, simplifying user management for over 90% of enterprises. Our console UX allows for fine-grained permissions and object tagging without deep API expertise. You can manage thousands of users and hundreds of roles with complete clarity. This focus on usability and robust security controls ensures your data access policies are both powerful and easy to maintain.

With access secured, the focus shifts to ensuring data is protected under EU-specific regulations.

Ensure Data and Key Control Under EU Jurisdiction

Digital sovereignty requires that your data remains under European legal control. We operate exclusively in certified EU data centers, offering country-level geofencing to meet strict data residency rules. All encryption keys are managed within the EU, and our Immutable Storage with Object Lock provides audit-ready ransomware protection for 100% of your critical backups. This design eliminates exposure to the US CLOUD Act. This commitment provides the legal certainty required for regulated industries like finance and healthcare. Your data's legal jurisdiction is as important as its physical location.

This foundation of sovereignty prepares your organization for upcoming regulatory changes.

Achieve Regulatory Readiness for the EU Data Act and NIS-2

New EU regulations demand greater data portability and continuous security processes. Our platform is designed for compliance with upcoming directives, giving you a competitive advantage. Here is how we align with two key regulations:

  • EU Data Act (from September 2025): We ensure data portability by design, allowing you to move all data, metadata, and versions without lock-in, as mandated by the new rules.
  • NIS-2 Directive: Our operations include continuous vulnerability management and supply-chain assurance, meeting the directive's stringent cybersecurity requirements for cloud providers.

Our proactive stance on compliance future-proofs your storage strategy.

This regulatory alignment is complemented by an economic model built for predictability.

Benefit From a Predictable and Transparent Economic Model

Unpredictable fees are a primary driver of budget overruns for 55% of European firms. Our pricing model is designed for clarity and predictability, with zero egress fees, no API call costs, and no minimum storage durations. This transparent approach allows you to forecast your storage expenses with over 99% accuracy. You only pay for the storage you actually use. This predictable cost structure provides stable, defensible margins for MSPs and simplifies budget planning for enterprise IT. Guaranteed service levels ensure your business planning is built on a reliable foundation.

This economic clarity empowers partners to build profitable services.

Empower MSPs and Channel Partners with a Partner-Ready Platform

We built our platform to help our partners succeed and grow their margins by at least 15%. The partner console features multi-tenant management with RBAC and MFA for secure client separation. Full automation is available via our API and CLI, simplifying onboarding and reporting for hundreds of clients. Our distribution momentum in 2025, with partners like api in Germany and Northamber plc in the UK, expands local access for resellers. This partner-centric model ensures you can deliver sovereign and compliant backup and archiving services profitably.

Ultimately, our entire platform is built to ensure you always retain control of your data.

Preserve Your Freedom with a Clear Exit Strategy

Vendor lock-in is a strategic risk for over 73% of cloud customers. We are committed to open standards to ensure you always have freedom of action. Our use of the S3 API standard means your data is always portable. You can use any S3-compatible tool for bulk data movement, preserving your negotiation power. An exit path is a key feature of our service. This commitment to interoperability aligns with the spirit of the EU Data Act, which mandates easier switching between cloud providers. Your long-term data strategy should never be limited by a single vendor.

Now is the time to transition to a truly sovereign cloud storage solution.

FAQ

What makes Impossible Cloud a strong alternative to a hyperscaler's object storage API?

Impossible Cloud provides a fully S3-compatible API, ensuring seamless integration with existing tools. Unlike hyperscalers, it offers a predictable cost model with no egress or API fees and is built as a sovereign-by-design platform, keeping all data under EU jurisdiction and free from CLOUD Act exposure.


How does the 'Always-Hot' storage model benefit my business?

Our 'Always-Hot' model means all your data is instantly accessible without any retrieval delays or extra fees associated with tiered storage. This simplifies operations, ensures predictable performance for applications, and makes it ideal for critical use cases like disaster recovery and ransomware protection.


Is my data protected from ransomware?

Yes. We provide Immutable Storage using S3 Object Lock. This feature allows you to make data unchangeable and undeletable for a specified period, providing a robust defense against ransomware attacks and ensuring you have a clean, recoverable copy of your data.


How does Impossible Cloud support MSPs and channel partners?

Our platform is partner-ready with a multi-tenant console, RBAC, and full automation via API/CLI. The predictable pricing model with zero egress fees allows partners to build services with stable, defensible margins. We are also expanding our distribution network with partners like 'api' (DE) and 'Northamber plc' (UK).


What does compliance with the EU Data Act mean for me?

Compliance with the EU Data Act, effective September 2025, means we provide data portability by design. You can easily switch providers without technical or contractual lock-in, as you can export all your data, including metadata and versions, at any time.


How do I migrate my data to Impossible Cloud?

Migration is straightforward due to our full S3 API compatibility. You can use your existing S3-native tools, scripts, or applications. Simply update the endpoint and credentials in your configuration, and your tools will work with our platform without any code changes.


Would you like more information?

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