The Open Cloud Alliance (OCA)

The sovereign alternative for the Dutch government and critical sectors.

What is the Open Cloud Alliance?

Maintaining control over data and IT infrastructure is a priority that Info Support has been actively advancing for many years. To further strengthen and accelerate this vision for digital autonomy, Info Support is one of the founding members of the Open Cloud Alliance (OCA).

This strategic coalition brings together seven leading partners: Centric, Info Support, Intermax, KPN, Nebul, Previder and Uniserver. The initiative is also actively supported by the Dutch Digital Infrastructure Association (DINL) and TNO.

With a combined capacity of more than 20 high-end data centres across the Netherlands, over 13,500 specialised employees and €6.5 billion in IT revenue, the alliance provides a powerful, secure and fully sovereign cloud alternative.

Our shared cloud infrastructure enables organisations to run critical applications and store sensitive data under Dutch and European jurisdiction, supported by technology that remains firmly under our own control.

The importance of a strong local foundation

Safeguarding our national information infrastructure and critical processes requires a strong, locally anchored and independent foundation. By innovating on the strength of Dutch and European technology, we create greater freedom of choice and retain full control over our data.

The Open Cloud Alliance was established to provide a robust response to today’s challenges surrounding digital dependency. The OCA’s key principles are:

Geopolitical resilience: Critical government systems and vital infrastructure must be able to operate independently at all times and remain protected from external geopolitical influence.

Protection under local legislation: By entrusting data exclusively to Dutch and European providers, it remains subject solely to local legislation. This ensures that privacy frameworks are strictly upheld, without exposure to foreign laws such as the US CLOUD Act.

Economic stimulus: By directing public and private IT investment towards a sovereign domestic foundation, capital continues to circulate within the Dutch and European economies. This supports local innovation and creates high-quality employment, in line with the recommendations of the Draghi report.

Genuine technological autonomy: The OCA warns against sovereignty washing, where local data storage alone is presented as being sovereign. Genuine autonomy requires true operational and technological independence.

How does it work?

The Open Cloud Alliance is not building a closed system, but an open, federated ecosystem. Our sovereign cloud platforms are based on four fundamental technical principles:

1

Open Architecture (Portability)

The cloud infrastructure is modular and transparent by design, preventing vendor lock-in. This modular structure makes it easy to move applications and databases between alliance partners or to your own on-premises environment.

2

Open Standards (Interoperability)

We use widely accepted and freely available open standards, as defined by organisations such as the Dutch Standardisation Forum and relevant European bodies.

In addition, the alliance is developing a standardised interface, based on an open API, that enables applications to be deployed seamlessly across a range of certified platforms.

3

Open Source Software (Transparency)

For the platform layer on which your systems run, we make maximum use of verifiable open source software. This ensures that the source code is fully transparent, auditable and free from hidden vulnerabilities or unauthorised access mechanisms.

4

Risk Diversification in Practice

By distributing our infrastructure across more than 20 Dutch data centres, we increase resilience against cyberattacks and power outages.

This distributed model also provides an effective response to regional congestion on the electricity grid. A network of smaller, geographically dispersed data centres is more resilient than a single, large-scale data centre.

Building a digitally autonomous Netherlands together

The Open Cloud Alliance supports the Dutch government, municipalities, provinces and organisations operating in critical sectors. Would you like to explore how your organisation can regain control over its IT infrastructure and data? Or would you like a technical overview of our open reference architecture? Info Support is ready to guide you.

Learn more about digital autonomy Learn more about the Info Support Cloud

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Do you have questions about your specific situation, or would you like to discuss your options with one of our experts? Complete the form and we will contact you shortly to arrange a no-obligation consultation.

Lammert Vinke

Managing Director | Unit Manager Managed Services