EU to designate AWS and Azure as DMA gatekeepers

The European Commission announced on Thursday, June 25, 2026, that it has taken the preliminary view that Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft Azure should be designated as "gatekeepers" under the bloc's Digital Markets Act (DMA). This marks the first time the EU has sought to apply these strict competition rules specifically to cloud infrastructure providers.

The move is notable because neither AWS, the largest cloud provider in the EU, nor Azure, the second-largest, meet the DMA's standard quantitative thresholds for user numbers and revenue. Instead, regulators are invoking the law's qualitative route, arguing that the services constitute an "important gateway between businesses and their customers." The Commission cited the companies' significant turnover, operational scale, entrenched user bases, and the high switching costs and "lock-in" effects that make it difficult for customers to change providers.

The preliminary findings follow a seven-month investigation launched last November. The Commission emphasized the growing importance of cloud services for the European economy and for artificial intelligence. Executive Vice-President Teresa Ribera stated that Europe is...