Microsoft strengthens its in-country data processing push with more sovereignty options

• Local Copilot processing to be live in Australia, India, Japan and the UK by the end of this year
• Microsoft’s ongoing commitment to the EU sees new Belgium data center on the way
• Azure Local customers are getting access to Nvidia’s latest GPUs

Microsoft has promised to bring in-country processing to Copilot to 15 markets by the end of 2026 in order to comply with data residency requirements, adding Canada, Germany, Italy, Malaysia, Poland, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the UAE and the US in 2026.

The expansion will all come in 2026, with Australia, India, Japan and the UK set to get access to localized processing by the end of 2025.

This is on top of end-to-end AI data processing within Europe as part of the EU Data Boundary.

Microsoft goes big on supporting localized data processing

Microsoft Specialized Clouds President and CTO Douglas Phillips announced a whole series of expanded features and services in a blog post, including improvements to Microsoft 365 Local, which he declared would get access to the latest Nvidia GPUs just like any other cloud.

Alluding to a positive uptake in the company’s sovereign technologies, Phillips added that Nvidia RTX Pro 6000 Blackwell Server Edition GPUs will become available in Azure Local. Users can scale to hundreds of servers, and disconnected operations coming in early 2026 will allow regulated industries to use Microsoft’s private cloud environments with on-prem control planes for maximum security.

In Europe specifically, Microsoft has already established a board of directors to oversee sovereignty compliance. A new Belgium data center is also in the works, adding to the company’s existing Austria site.

Other upcoming changes include Azure Site Recovery within Azure Local to reduce downtime during outages and dedicated EU-based Microsoft engineers and operators to comply with Sovereign Public Cloud principles.

Acknowledging that customers may also want the flexibility to combine local providers with Microsoft’s tools, the company has also partnered with Delos Cloud in Germany and Bleu in France to support their governments.

With these continual improvements to sovereignty options and partnerships with local third parties, Microsoft’s response to customer demands is refreshing. Recently slated for vendor lock-in, it’s clear that Microsoft is upping its game as the global cloud industry shifts.

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