Europe's Chip Investment Leaves Cloud Dependency Unchanged
Hardware manufacturing alone cannot deliver technological sovereignty when cloud platforms and software ecosystems remain concentrated elsewhere.
Billions Spent on Fabrication Capacity
The European Union has committed substantial funding to semiconductor fabrication facilities as part of its technology sovereignty agenda. According to analysis from Forrester, this investment addresses only one layer of the technology stack.
While chip manufacturing matters, the research firm notes that dependence on American and Chinese technology remains firmly in place at the cloud infrastructure and software platform layers. These are the points where most organizations actually consume computing resources.
Where Control Actually Resides
Cloud platforms and the software that runs on them represent the operational reality for most businesses. Control over chip fabrication does not translate to control over these layers, where American hyperscalers dominate European usage.
The gap between hardware sovereignty and practical technological independence suggests that Europe's approach may need to address the full stack rather than focusing on manufacturing alone.