[alephnerd]

> Some data sharing arrangement can be generated...

The EU and India are starting to work on formalizing a data transfer mechanism similar to the EU-US Data Transfer Mechanism (DTM) as part of the EU-India TTC [0] (a US-EU TTC was a a precursor to formalizing the EU-US DTM).

Depending on how the EU-India FTA shakes out (signing after Republic Day on January 27th), it might make it easier to "India-wash" American services exports (which is already what is happening).

The fact that an EU "sovereign" cloud like STACKIT is using American-Israeli security software [1] (though they did open an office in Prague to outsource some development, but is largely done in Israel I believe) and Google Workspaces [2] as part of it's sovereign cloud initiative highlights how it's all HN bark with little-to-no bite.

That said, kudos to SpaceTime [3] for trying to leverage the momentum to build a GTM channel via NukeProof.

[0] - https://in.boell.org/en/2025/05/27/tapping-momentum-eu-india...

[1] - https://www.sentinelone.com/press/sentinelone-and-schwarz-di...

[2] - https://gruppe.schwarz/en/press/archive/2024/companies-of-sc...

[3] - https://spacetime.eu/blog/nuke-proof-alliance-launches-to-br...

[Imustaskforhelp]

Thanks, good to see EU and India make a deal, might help my idea personally.

But this is the first time I hear someone mention "India-wash" American services exports?

What do you mean in this context? I hope it's nothing deregoratory but I am simply confused by this term.

Personally I meant either hosting open source software or building my own open source software and hosting it for the most part imo.

I don't know what you mean by India-wash though?

[alephnerd]

> I don't know what you mean by India-wash though?

For examples - should EU-US digital services be impacted by larger diplomatic spat, as much of GCP's development and leadership is colocated in HYD, if needed leadership and operations could become part of Google Cloud India Pvt Ltd [0], so an "American" BigTech company like Google Cloud can continue to operate like normal. Most American (and Israeli) tech companies have an Indian subsidiary that can do such a motion.

> Personally I meant either hosting open source software or building my own open source software and hosting it for the most part imo

You can contribute OSS on your own, but from personal experience the EU is primarily looking to it's private sector players who themselves are largely using American (but developed in India) or Israeli closed source products under the hood, or at most open-core. A Stallman or Doctorow style open source advocate isn't getting much airtime in the corridors that matter.

Heck, this initiative is itself a lead-gen initiative by closed source SpaceTime [1].

> I hope it's nothing deregoratory

It's more derogatory to EU initiatives than India. All these flashy announcements hide the fact that most businesses and organizations in the EU continue to operate using non-EU developed software and continue to do so. Yet any attempt at building a durable long term foundation a la the Draghi report is ignored, as Draghi himself pointed out a couple months back [2].

Heck, the much touted EU-Mercosur FTA has just been frozen barely a couple hours ago [3]

[0] - https://www.bloomberg.com/profile/company/2026164D:IN

[1] - https://spacetime.eu/blog/nuke-proof-alliance-launches-to-br...

[2] - https://www.france24.com/en/tv-shows/business/20250916-mario...

[3] - https://www.reuters.com/world/eu-lawmakers-vote-whether-laun...

[Imustaskforhelp]

Oh alright! Now things are more clear!

Now it does make sense, I do think that Europe should look at Open source more too and contribute as such.

I do agree with what you are saying but supposing the geopolitical spat between America and Europe, It doesn't make sense to me why European countries might trust Indian subsidiaries of American companies.

Sure they might sound sovereign but in reality, they aren't. SO what's the point?

Why not get Independent Indian developers and the startup culture established around it (Although one of the issues I feel with this approach is that VC capital does include America, personally I wish to stay away from much of VC money)

> It's more derogatory to EU initiatives than India. All these flashy announcements hide the fact that most businesses and organizations in the EU continue to operate using non-EU developed software and continue to do so. Yet any attempt at building a durable long term foundation a la the Draghi report is ignored, as Draghi himself pointed out a couple months back [2].

Agreed.

I do feel like a reason why I wanted to establish EU company was to show my acknowledgement of Open source and privacy focus and to get more EU businesses interested. But right now, I feel like I am way more willing to have Open source or at the very least if restrictive, then creating source available software & still having an EU presence & an appreciation towards it.

But like, EU definitely needs to focus on Open source offerings more so than looking for EU alternatives in general which as you mention might be built using closed source products of American companies. It still doesn't effectively prevent the lock-in or worries in case of a geopolitical spat for EU in reality but only on the papers.

To be honest, I am open to open sourcing much of my products (ideologically) but the problems I feel in open source is that its hard to even make a developer salary comparatively even in India.

Open source definitely needs more funding. Probably EU can fund Open source without any bias could be great too?

[alephnerd]

> It doesn't make sense to me why European countries might trust Indian subsidiaries of American companies

Because most European companies are paying lip service to EU sovereignty because of how tightly coupled they are to the US. Look at how the EU-China spat led to Nexperia China's de facto decoupling which shut down the EU automotive industry for a couple months. It's even worse with regards to American dependency.

> Why not get Independent Indian developers and the startup culture established around it

Because the dependency then comes from India. An "Atmanirbhar" EU means having the capacity for self-reliance almost entirely within the EU and without a dependency on non-EU states like India or Israel.

> It still doesn't effectively prevent the lock-in or worries in case of a geopolitical spat for EU in reality but only on the papers

European companies (like all companies) don't care about open-source once they become dominant in a segment - for example ERP and SAP and SUSE Linux, and industrial systems.

> To be honest, I am open to open sourcing much of my products (ideologically) but the problems I feel in open source is that its hard to even make a developer salary comparatively even in India

That's the reality of OSS. There's a reason most OSS contributors for critical projects are employed by the organizations that heavily utilize that project (eg. Python and Google, OCaml and Jane Street).

[Imustaskforhelp]

Yeah I thought about it for a few hours. I don't intend on creating lip service so I am gonna probably try to go with the more reasonable & economically sound approach of having an Indian company instead right now as an Indian. You are right instead of trying to build an EU first, I will instead try to build a privacy first and if the objectives still align, hopefully I have shown that if privacy first means to have an EU parent company or any other scenario, I am open/curious/willing to do for privacy for the average user.

https://news.ycombinator.com/view?id=46712907

I do believe that open source has its value. I love Open source and Privacy first is only possible with OSS-first. I have always been interested in how to monetize Open source (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45558430) where the reason I found most people aren't interested or weren't (not sure if the mood changed now that the geopolitical wind has changed completely) but the reason I found was that people wanted OSS to almost be perfect but the rough corners in OSS were usually for the most part because of lack of funding.

So, I will probably try out some ways of funding OSS or at the very least have it be in a source available license. Proprietory just doesn't align with my idea of privacy first.

So yea hopefully it makes sense and we can all create or use privacy preserving services.

At the end of the day, I just hope that OSS can find ways to be funded. Much of what I want to do wouldn't be a problem or wouldn't even exist (As I got much of ideas that I want to implement because OSS wasn't funded and I had made that thread on HN) and honestly I hope that one day OSS can be funded the way it truly deserves.

have a nice day man!

[alephnerd]

No worries. And honestly, my opinion is make your product an open-core product, but as an Indian founder you have no choice but to use the Indian and Indian-American VC network. Most cybersecurity and open-core VCs are either Indian-Americans or Indian nationals, so it's easier to go that path instead of the European path where valuations and deal terms are very anti-founder in nature.

With the right metrics, you could end up at YC.