Sovereign cloud drives forward the digitalisation of public administration

The German Public Administration Cloud Strategy aims to bring together a wide range of cloud solutions across the federal levels of government and to enable services and software solutions within the public sector to be used interchangeably and across different locations. By using a shared cloud platform, many public authorities can not only save on investment, time and staff resources that are needed but not currently available; above all, it enables public administration to become more flexible. In this context, easier data exchange and the shared use of data are key advantages.

Furthermore, the public sector becomes less dependent on individual commercial cloud providers. This will enable it to implement administration-specific security requirements and compliance standards more easily. After all, transparency, data security and data portability are top priorities, particularly in the public sector.

Sovereign cloud: diverse solutions for the digitalisation of public administration

Modern, interconnected registers play a key role in the digitalisation of public administration. The availability of a sovereign cloud will be of great importance here. Modern registers are implemented as a service from the cloud. Similarly, OZG services can be provided from the cloud in line with the ‘one for all’ (EfA) approach, enabling all public authorities to benefit from the solutions. It has become clear that cross-state cooperation and the division of labour in the development of OZG services are indispensable for making e-government services available to citizens and businesses as quickly as possible across the board.

Furthermore, the Sovereign Cloud is a prerequisite for decentralised, federated data spaces, which enable private and public providers to work together. This enables innovative solutions, particularly in the field of mobility – for example, for smart parking and intelligent, connected mobility services – and in the area of improving energy efficiency – for example, through intelligent building, energy and environmental monitoring.

Roadmap to a multi-cloud architecture: containers and landing zones

One of the key aspects of implementing the administrative cloud is to develop and operate future specialist processes as ‘cloud-native’ from the outset. To achieve the required platform independence, a process known as ‘containerisation’ is employed. This means that previously monolithic application blocks are broken down into self-contained microservices that can be used in a wide variety of specialist processes.

This is where technologies for managing and automating containerised applications and services come into play – in particular the open-source system Kubernetes. This key standard for the sovereign cloud describes how containers must be structured and the rules according to which they can be combined to form functioning applications. This ensures that the applications created are platform-independent, available at all times and can run securely. Materna draws on its expertise as a certified Kubernetes service provider in this regard.

Furthermore, with Journey2CloudTM Public, we have developed an architecture on which cloud landing zones can be set up as interfaces for different providers and adapted to different public authorities. Using a development environment based on the Delos Cloud concept, Materna is already one of the first providers to be testing use cases and offering proofs of concept to public authorities. These include containerised registry applications as well as internet portals, e-file solutions and AI solutions.

You can find more information on taking your first steps towards the sovereign cloud on our website.

More on the “Sovereign Cloud” series:
Part 1: Sovereign Cloud drives
digitalisation in public administration; Part 2: Ready for the Sovereign Cloud? Public sector data centres in the spotlight
Part 3 Cloudy with a chance of specialist procedures: how the Sovereign Cloud is revolutionising
public administration Part 4 New perspectives: GIS goes Sovereign Cloud