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To Scaleway
Migrating from AWS to Scaleway: A Practical Guide for European Businesses
AWS has long been the default choice for most cloud workloads. It is reliable, well documented, and deeply embedded in modern infrastructure. But for European businesses, especially those handling personal data, operating in regulated industries, or dealing with GDPR, that default choice is no longer so straightforward.
The CLOUD Act gives US authorities the legal power to compel American companies to hand over data stored anywhere in the world. AWS is an American company, which means that no matter where your data is physically hosted, whether in Ireland, Frankfurt, or Paris, it can still fall under US jurisdiction if AWS holds it.
This series looks at Scaleway as a practical, production ready European alternative. Scaleway is 100% European owned, SEAL 3 certified, and was awarded part of the EU Commission’s €180 million sovereign cloud contract in April 2026. It is not a compromise. For most standard workloads, it offers a real improvement in data sovereignty, often at a considerably lower cost.
What This Series Covers
Seven posts, written for technical decision-makers and developers who already know AWS and want to understand what moving to Scaleway actually involves.
Post 1: Why European Businesses Are Moving Away from AWS — Covers the case for data sovereignty, explains the CLOUD Act in plain English, and looks at what SEAL 3 means in real terms. For European businesses processing personal data under GDPR, understanding why US cloud ownership matters is the essential first step before evaluating any alternative.
Post 2: Scaleway vs AWS — Core Services Compared — A direct comparison of EC2 and Virtual Instances, RDS and Managed Databases, S3 and Object Storage, and EKS and Kapsule. Written for engineers already familiar with AWS, it covers what maps across cleanly, what works differently, and where to expect the most effort during a migration.
Post 3: The CLOUD Act Problem — What It Means for Your AWS Data — Explains the CLOUD Act risk in straightforward language, includes the Microsoft French Senate testimony, and looks at why AWS European entities do not fully address the jurisdiction problem. The strongest post in the series for compliance teams and GDPR officers making the case internally.
Post 4: Scaleway Pricing vs AWS — What You Actually Save — Breaks down service by service cost differences, including egress fees, the Kubernetes control plane, and compute. Uses directional percentages rather than specific figures, covering the areas where Scaleway is consistently less expensive than equivalent AWS configurations for European workloads.
Post 5: Migrating from AWS to Scaleway — A Step-by-Step Checklist — Walks through a practical migration sequence, from initial workload audit through data migration, DNS cutover, parallel running, and decommissioning. Includes specific notes on object storage endpoints, cache migration strategy, and how to handle the parallel running phase without blowing the budget.
Post 6: Scaleway for Regulated Industries — GDPR, DORA, and Public Sector — Looks at how SEAL 3 status, GDPR data residency, and the absence of CLOUD Act exposure can support compliance requirements for regulated businesses. Covers financial services under DORA, healthcare DPIAs, legal professional confidentiality obligations, and Irish public sector procurement considerations.
Post 7: Getting Started with Scaleway — Free Credits, Trials, and First Steps — Covers the free Business account credit, the startup programme, and practical first steps including spinning up a Virtual Instance, connecting to Object Storage using existing AWS CLI tooling, and setting up a Managed Database for evaluation.
Who Should Read This
This series is written for CTOs, lead developers, and technical architects at European companies that are currently using AWS and starting to question whether it is still the right fit. It is also useful for compliance teams, GDPR officers, and procurement leads who are dealing with growing concerns around data sovereignty and cloud risk.
If you are already familiar with AWS services such as EC2, RDS, S3, and EKS, you will find clear comparisons to equivalent Scaleway services throughout the series. If you are less technical, Posts 1, 3, and 4 are written to be easy to follow without requiring deep infrastructure knowledge.
About iWorks
iWorks is a Dublin-based technology consultancy. We help Irish and European businesses with cloud infrastructure, legacy system modernisation, and digital strategy. For clients where data sovereignty matters, we work with Scaleway and STACKIT as our preferred European cloud providers. This series is aimed at European businesses currently running workloads on AWS who are considering a move to a European sovereign cloud provider. For our STACKIT equivalent series, see here.
If you have questions about anything covered in this series or would like to discuss a migration project, you can reach us here.