The digital transformation of public administration in Germany has reached a major milestone: following an 18-month building phase, Germany’s government cloud (Deutsche Verwaltungscloud, DVC) was symbolically launched today at the 13th expert conference of the IT Planning Council.

State Secretary Markus Richter said: “The past 18 months have been hard work, because many challenges had to be overcome in the course of the implementation project. This project was able to succeed thanks to the determination and unwavering commitment of the participating IT service providers, govdigital and the Agency for Federal IT Cooperation (FITKO). Cooperation within the working group on cloud computing and digital sovereignty and also within the steering committee for the implementation project proved that when the national associations of local authorities, the federal and state governments and the other participants all pull together, they can achieve great things. So I would like to express my sincere thanks to all those involved for their untiring dedication.”

The new government cloud makes it possible to offer secure, standardised cloud services for government agencies everywhere in Germany. After registering and logging in to the government cloud service portal, staff responsible for IT can order cloud solutions for their agencies easily and in compliance with the applicable law. In this way, they can steadily expand the portfolio of attractive cloud services they offer their clients.

The standards and requirements of Germany’s government cloud make it possible for applications to be run in different cloud locations and used nationwide. This encourages the broader use of existing IT solutions, such as software from opencode.de. The government cloud will permanently strengthen the digital sovereignty of the entire public administration, because open standards ensure that the public administration can switch IT solutions and avoid lock-in effects.

The government cloud is a multi-cloud of the federal and state governments. It currently only offers cloud services which are developed and made available by IT service providers of the public administration. The introduction of the government cloud is the result of exemplary cooperation between the federal and state levels. The implementation project which was adopted by the IT Planning Council in 2024 was able to initiate the development and implementation of the government cloud and drive it forward.

In the coming months, the government cloud will gradually be expanded to enable the nationwide use and inclusion of all relevant administrative services. In the process, joint calls for tender will strengthen the position of the public administration in contract negotiations. Stronger networks to link the individual cloud data centres are planned, which will increase resilience. By working with European partners, economies of scale will be developed.

For more information, see the DVC website:

https://www.deutsche-verwaltungscloud.de