Oracle’s European investment drive continues in Germany and the Netherlands – here’s why it’s a key market for the cloud giant

Oracle has announced plans to invest $3 billion in Germany and the Netherlands as the cloud computing giant continues its European infrastructure push.

Over the next five years, the firm will invest $2 billion to expand its Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) footprint in Germany, with a big increase in AI infrastructure capacity in the Oracle Cloud Frankfurt region in particular.

In a statement outlining the plans, Thorsten Herrmann, senior vice president and Germany country leader at Oracle, said the move is aimed at helping organizations across the country “accelerate their AI and cloud journeys”.

“In addition, we’re supporting the federal government’s objective of strengthening Germany as a hub for AI investment and innovation in Europe,” Herrmann added.

The investment will also help Oracle meet demand for sovereign cloud and AI services in the German public sector and other industries, including the manufacturing, automotive, renewable energy, scientific research, and healthcare sectors.

As part of the move, Oracle confirmed startups and investors across Germany will be given access to infrastructure for AI training and inference, as well as multi-cloud options.

"We are pleased about increasing investments, both from Germany and internationally, and expressly welcome this investment," said Karsten Wildberger, federal minister for digital transformation and government modernization.

"It strengthens our digital infrastructure and enables companies and public authorities to benefit from state-of-the-art AI and cloud technologies."

Meanwhile, in the Netherlands, Oracle is planning to invest $1 billion over the same timespan to meet growing demand for AI and cloud services. This will see the company significantly expand AI infrastructure capacity in the Oracle Cloud Amsterdam region.

The plan is to target organizations in key local industries such as financial services, logistics, life sciences, and energy.

Oracle is all in on European expansion

These latest investment announcements come amid a big push across the region, which the hyperscaler views as a market ripe with opportunities.

Earlier this year, Oracle unveiled plans to invest $5 billion in the UK, significantly expanding its OCI footprint across the country.

A similar $1 billion investment in Spain last year was also announced, with a keen focus on supporting the country’s financial services sector.

Larry Ellison, CTO and chairman of Oracle, has been highly vocal about Oracle's plans across Europe in recent years, identifying it as a key market for the company amidst the growing demand for sovereign cloud services.

Speaking last year, Ellison said he expects every country to have its own sovereign cloud setup, noting at the time that the company was in negotiations with a number of national governments.

Enterprise appetite for sovereign cloud options has surged across Europe, largely in response to stringent regulatory requirements on data protection.

Speaking to ITPro last year, senior Forrester analyst said sovereign cloud options are now the “bare minimum” expected from customers in the region - and providers have pivoted hard to expand options on this front.

Alongside Oracle, a host of industry competitors including Google, Microsoft, and AWS have been rushing to launch their own sovereign cloud services.

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