The verdict in three sentences
For an SME that must leave US-owned hosting to win a public-sector client, migrating to an EU-sovereign provider such as OVHcloud or Scaleway costs EUR 3,000 to 10,000 in 2026, and the monthly bill often ends up equal or lower than on AWS or Azure. A properly sized VPS (EUR 20 to 120 per month) is enough for most business apps; managed Kubernetes (EUR 150 to 600) only pays off beyond several services. Certified sovereign clouds (SecNumCloud in France, C5-based offers in Germany) are only required for sensitive government data, and they change the budget significantly.
Why the question comes up in 2026
European public buyers increasingly add a clause requiring hosting "in the European Union, by a provider not subject to extraterritorial legislation". The US Cloud Act applies to the European subsidiaries of AWS, Azure and Google, which makes those offers fragile against such a clause, even with a region in Frankfurt or Paris. For the CFO, the issue is twofold: do not lose the contract, and do not blow up the infrastructure bill.
Hosting providers compared for a business app
Prices below are 2026 orders of magnitude, excluding VAT, for a standard web app (one backend, a PostgreSQL database, file storage, 200 to 2,000 users).
| Component | OVHcloud | Scaleway | AWS (Frankfurt/Paris) | Azure (Germany/France) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| VPS or instance 4 vCPU / 8 GB | EUR 20 to 40 / month | EUR 25 to 50 / month | EUR 110 to 140 / month | EUR 120 to 150 / month |
| Managed Kubernetes (3 nodes) | EUR 150 to 400 / month | EUR 180 to 600 / month | EUR 300 to 700 / month | EUR 300 to 650 / month |
| Managed PostgreSQL (high availability) | EUR 40 to 250 / month | EUR 50 to 300 / month | EUR 200 to 600 / month | EUR 220 to 650 / month |
| Object storage 1 TB | EUR 10 to 15 / month | EUR 12 to 15 / month | EUR 23 / month + egress | EUR 20 / month + egress |
| Outbound traffic 2 TB | Included | Mostly included | EUR 150 to 180 / month | EUR 150 to 175 / month |
| Subject to the Cloud Act | No | No | Yes | Yes |
| Certified sovereign offer | Yes (dedicated range) | Not in 2026 | No | No (via separate partner offers) |
Two takeaways. European providers are 2 to 4 times cheaper on raw compute and barely charge for outbound traffic. AWS and Azure keep the edge on catalogue depth (message queues, managed AI, serverless functions), which matters if your app relies heavily on them.
What the migration costs
Migration cost depends mostly on how tied you are to your current cloud's proprietary services.
| Starting point | 2026 migration cost (excl. VAT) | Timeline | Main risk |
|---|---|---|---|
| Containerized app (Docker), PostgreSQL | EUR 3,000 to 5,000 | 2 to 3 weeks | Low |
| App on EC2 or VMs, no containers | EUR 4,000 to 7,000 | 3 to 4 weeks | Reworking deployments |
| Uses S3, SQS, Lambda | EUR 6,000 to 10,000 | 4 to 6 weeks | Rewriting proprietary calls |
| Aurora or DynamoDB database | EUR 7,000 to 10,000+ | 5 to 8 weeks | Data migration and performance |
| Move to a certified sovereign cloud | EUR 15,000+ | 2 to 4 months | Documentation and contractual requirements |
On top of this, add monitoring (EUR 5 to 30 per month), off-site backups in a second region (EUR 15 to 60 per month) and a tested disaster recovery plan, which public buyers increasingly request in the technical annex.
Certified sovereign cloud: when it is mandatory
Government doctrines in France and Germany require certified sovereign clouds for particularly sensitive data (health, civil servant data, strategic data). For a room-booking tool or a municipal appointment portal, an EU provider not subject to the Cloud Act is usually enough. Read the technical specifications carefully before paying a 2 to 3 times premium on infrastructure.
Mini case study
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Nathalie, CFO of a 45-employee software company in Berlin that sells a school canteen management tool, wins a contract with a regional authority on condition of hosting outside the Cloud Act. Current AWS bill: EUR 1,450 per month (EC2, RDS, S3, outbound traffic).
Target on OVHcloud: 2 instances at EUR 40, high-availability managed PostgreSQL at EUR 180, object storage at EUR 15, second-region backup at EUR 45, monitoring at EUR 20. Total: EUR 340 per month. Migration priced at EUR 6,500 (rewriting S3 calls and automating deployments).
Monthly saving: EUR 1,110. The migration pays for itself in 6 months, and the public contract, worth EUR 85,000 over 3 years, is secured.
FAQ
OVHcloud or Scaleway: which one?
OVHcloud is cheaper on VPS and offers a certified sovereign range. Scaleway offers a smoother developer experience and serverless services; for a classic business app, the cost gap stays under 20%.
Does the migration cause downtime?
With database replication prepared in advance, the final cutover takes 30 minutes to 2 hours, scheduled in the evening or at the weekend.
Is an AWS region in Frankfurt enough for GDPR?
For GDPR alone, often yes with the right contractual clauses. But a clause requiring immunity from extraterritorial laws in a public tender rules it out, wherever the servers sit.
Should we move to Kubernetes at the same time?
Rarely for an SME: below 5 services, two VPS with Docker and a load balancer cost 3 to 5 times less and stay simpler to maintain.
Who runs the infrastructure after the migration?
We offer managed operations from EUR 150 to 600 per month, including updates, monitoring and quarterly restore tests.
Let's scope your project. Send us your current cloud bill and the hosting clause from the tender: we price the migration (EUR 3,000 to 10,000) and the target monthly bill, delivered in 2 to 6 weeks. Detailed quote within 48 h. WhatsApp +221 77 596 93 33.
Mohamed Bah
Fondateur, Kolonell
Passionate about digital and entrepreneurship in Africa, Mohamed has been helping Sénégalese businesses with their digital transformation since 2020. Founder of Kolonell, he believes every SME deserves a professional and accessible online présence.
