www.it-connect.fr
France Replaces Microsoft with Scaleway to Host Health Data
Microsoft’s chapter is closing for France’s Health Data Platform (PDS). This Thursday, April 23, 2026, the news was made official: Scaleway, the Cloud subsidiary of the Iliad group, has won the contract tied to the Health Data Hub. From now on, French health data will be hosted on sovereign infrastructure.
A choice driven by technological sovereignty
Faced with repeated questions about using an American solution, namely Microsoft, to store such critical information, this change in direction was expected. It is now official.
The name of the winner was announced this Thursday, April 23, 2026, even though it had initially been expected by the end of March. Scaleway faced competition from OVHcloud, Atos, and Cloud Temple, but the Iliad group’s Cloud subsidiary was ultimately selected.
The selection process was relatively long: two and a half months. At the same time, the specifications were substantial, with 350 technical requirements to meet. The government cannot afford to make a mistake: this infrastructure must ensure, over the long term, the protection, resilience, and strategic autonomy of France and Europe in health data processing.
"The PDS and Scaleway are therefore committing today to provide health research and innovation stakeholders with a secure environment capable of hosting health insurance reimbursement data and other health databases of interest," the press release states.
Scaleway will therefore host health databases, including a copy of the main database of the French National Health Data System (SNDS). I encourage you to read this CNIL article to learn more about the value of SNDS, which is under the responsibility of the National Health Insurance Fund for Salaried Workers (CNAMTS).
There is still one point to watch: while Scaleway is already HDS-certified (Health Data Hosting Provider), it is still being assessed for the coveted SecNumCloud visa. This qualification, issued by ANSSI, must be obtained because it is a non-negotiable requirement for hosting Health Data Hub data.
"Scaleway has demonstrated its ability to meet these requirements by offering an infrastructure operated in Europe, capable of supporting critical workloads and large volumes. With its ‘Health Data Hosting’ (HDS) certification, Scaleway has also demonstrated the credibility of its SecNumCloud qualification path, which is essential for hosting sensitive PDS data.", the Scaleway press release states.
A migration is coming from Microsoft to Scaleway
Scaleway’s selection was formalized on April 23, 2026, but the full transition will still take several months. Indeed, a migration from Microsoft to Scaleway now has to be carried out, and in terms of timing, the move is expected between late 2026 and early 2027.
As a reminder, Microsoft was chosen to host the Health Data Platform in late 2019. This migration to a sovereign host has therefore been awaited for several years, and it will finally become reality.
