net.DE

What net.DE does

net.DE AG is a Hannover-based, founder-owned managed cloud and infrastructure provider operating two proprietary, ISO 27001-certified data centers in Hannover-Vahrenwald and Hannover-Laatzen, connected by a private fiber ring called the Galaxy Network. The company delivers cloud infrastructure built on OpenStack (Orion private cloud, Antares public cloud with dedicated resource pools and standardized Antares Orbit VMs) and VMware vSphere/vCenter/vSAN (Nebula Cloud, offered in Basic, Managed, and Hybrid configurations) for German enterprises and the Mittelstand seeking data sovereignty, GDPR compliance, and independence from US hyperscalers. Its platform portfolio is complemented by modular add-on services: S3-compatible object storage with no egress or API request fees, managed services (24/7 monitoring, patching, incident handling, backup control), colocation, internet lines and SD-WAN/VPN site connectivity, and a Sovereign AI API offering OpenAI-compatible inference from open-source models (gpt-oss-20b/120b, Qwen3-VL-30B, LightOnOCR-2-1B, bge-m3, bge-reranker-v2-m3) hosted exclusively in German data centers with no prompt logging.

The company monetizes primarily through recurring monthly subscriptions on 12- to 36-month contracts, supplemented by token-based usage billing on the Sovereign AI API (minimum monthly commitments of €250–€1,000 across tiers S/M/L) and project-based IT consulting fees. Pricing is largely quote-based for enterprise deployments, with public list pricing on standardized tiers ranging from €21/month for an Antares Orbit.S VM up to multi-thousand-euro dedicated Orion Private Cloud stacks (384 physical cores, 3 TB RAM, 72 TB NVMe at XL1 tier). Sales are direct via consultation bookings, phone, and email, supported by content marketing (blog, case studies) and customer-logo social proof rather than paid advertising or channel partners; the company serves only the German market. Named enterprise customers include TUI AG, Schaeffler Technologies (global web hosting across two data centers), expert SE (managed Kubernetes and MPLS networking for 410 retail locations), Heise Gruppe, Der Paritätische, WAGNER Group, and Kelvion, spanning aviation, automotive, retail, publishing, healthcare, and manufacturing verticals.

Name

net.DE

Legal name

net.DE AG

Website

https://net.de

Company type

Private

Founded year

1989

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

11–50 employees

Short description

net.DE AG is a founder-owned German managed cloud provider operating two ISO 27001-certified data centers in Hannover, delivering OpenStack and VMware-based private, public, and hybrid cloud infrastructure, S3 storage, managed services, and a sovereign OpenAI-compatible AI API to German enterprises and the Mittelstand requiring GDPR-compliant data residency.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Cloud Infrastructure Services

NAICS

Computing Infrastructure Providers, Data Processing, Web Hosting, and Related Services (5182), Other Warehousing and Storage (493190)

SIC

Services-Computer Programming Services (7371), Services-Prepackaged Software (7372), Public Warehousing & Storage (4220)

akta.pro primary industry

General-Purpose Compute (VMs & Bare Metal IaaS) (HDABAAAA)

akta.pro secondary industries

Enterprise PaaS (App Runtime & Managed Application Platforms) (HDAEAKAB), Cloud Networking Core Services (VPC/VNet, Load Balancing, DNS, NAT) (HDABAAAJ), Managed Application Platforms (App PaaS & Runtime Services) (HDABAAAD)

Keywords

• Sovereign cloud infrastructure
• Private cloud hosting
• Managed cloud services
• Data center colocation
• Enterprise cloud platform

Headquarters

HQ city

Hanover

HQ country

Germany

HQ region

Europe

Offices3 records

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Infrastructure, Personnel, Operations, Technology or R&D, Marketing or Sales

Revenue model

1. Cloud Infrastructure (Orion, Antares, Nebula): Monthly subscription fees for dedicated or shared cloud infrastructure. Pricing based on resource consumption (CPU cores, RAM, storage). Delivered as dedicated resource pools or shared environments with clear cost visibility.
2. AI API (Sovereign AI API): Token-based consumption billing for AI API usage (input/output tokens per million). Minimum monthly spend commitments per package tier (S: €250, M: €500, L: €1,000). Additional revenue from premium model access (120B) and priority (prio) service tier.
3. Managed Services: Monthly fees for ongoing operational support including monitoring, patch management, incident management, and backup control. Modular service packages.
4. Colocation: Monthly fees for rack space, cage areas, power, cooling, and network connectivity for customer-owned hardware deployed in net.DE data centers.
5. S3 Object Storage: Monthly storage fees per GB (€0.02–0.12/GB). No egress or API request charges. Volume tiers: Performance, Volume Protected, Volume Pure.
6. Internet Connectivity & Site Networking: Monthly fees for internet lines, VPN, SD-WAN, and dedicated fiber connections. Bandwidth from 100 Mbit/s to 10 Gbit/s. Redundant carrier connectivity.
7. IT Consulting: Professional consulting fees for cloud strategy, migration, hybrid-cloud design, compliance architecture, and workshops/training. Provided by cloud architects.

Pricing tiers

Go-to-market motion2 records

Distribution channels3 records

Marketing channels5 records

Core offering

net.DE AG delivers sovereign cloud infrastructure (private, public, and VMware-based), managed IT operations, S3-compatible object storage, colocation, internet and site connectivity, and a Sovereign AI API from two proprietary ISO 27001-certified data centers in Hannover. Services are sold directly to mid-sized and enterprise German organizations with personal architect support, 100% green electricity, GDPR compliance, and transparent recurring subscriptions.

Product overview

net.DE operates a multi-cloud platform portfolio hosted in two self-owned ISO 27001-certified data centers in Hannover, Germany. The core cloud offerings are differentiated by deployment model: Orion (dedicated private cloud on OpenStack with dedicated hardware for highest sovereignty), Antares (shared public cloud on OpenStack with a dedicated resource pool), Antares Orbit (standardized single VMs on Antares), and Nebula (VMware-based cloud for existing VMware environments, available as self-managed, fully managed, or hybrid with OpenStack). These cloud platforms are complemented by modular add-on services: S3 Object Storage (S3-compatible, free egress and API requests), Managed Services (monitoring, patching, incident handling), Colocation (customer hardware in net.DE racks), Internet Lines & Site Connectivity (VPN, SD-WAN, dedicated fiber), and the Sovereign AI API (OpenAI-compatible AI interface with German data residency and no prompt logging). The entire portfolio is delivered with personal architect support, 100% green power, and a PUE of 1.3.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Products and services

• Orion Cloud (Private Cloud) Fully isolated private cloud on OpenStack running on dedicated hardware in net.DE's own German data centers, offering maximum data sovereignty, ISO 27001-certified management, and personal architect support. Targets organizations with high security or governance requirements such as finance, healthcare, and government.
• Antares Cloud (Public Cloud) OpenStack-based public cloud platform providing a dedicated resource pool (CPU, RAM, NVMe storage) where customers self-manage VMs, clusters, and networks. Runs in ISO 27001-certified German data centers, with full architectural freedom and transparent pricing.
• Antares Orbit Standardized single virtual machine instances on the Antares Cloud platform, provided with full root access. Five pre-configured models (Orbit.S through Orbit.2XL) for fast deployment of test systems, Proof of Concepts, and smaller production workloads.
• Nebula Cloud (VMware) VMware-based virtualized cloud platform (vSphere, vCenter, vSAN) for customers migrating or continuing to operate existing VMware environments. Runs in net.DE's German data centers, available as self-managed (Nebula Basic), fully managed (Nebula Managed), or hybrid with OpenStack (Nebula Hybrid).
• S3 Object Storage S3-compatible object storage with free egress and free API requests. Three performance tiers: Performance (€0.12/GB/month), Volume Protected (€0.04/GB/month), and Volume Pure (€0.02/GB/month). Operated exclusively in German data centers with versioning support for backups, disaster recovery, and archiving.
• Managed Services Modular managed IT operations service covering monitoring and alerting (24/7), patch and update management, backup control, and incident handling. Complements Orion, Antares, and Nebula cloud platforms. Customers choose the level of support from partial to full-service packages.
• Colocation Physical server housing in net.DE's two data centers in Hannover (Vahrenwald and Laatzen). Customers retain full control of their own hardware while receiving power, cooling, network connectivity, physical security, and optional direct links to Orion, Antares, and Nebula cloud platforms.
• Internet Lines & Site Connectivity Dedicated internet connections and site-to-site networking including VPN, SD-WAN, and direct fiber connections from 100 Mbit/s to 10 Gbit/s. Features redundant carrier lines, end-to-end encryption, firewall integration, and direct connectivity to net.DE data centers. Supports hybrid cloud architectures and multi-branch centralization.
• Sovereign AI API OpenAI-compatible AI API operated from German data centers with clean tenant separation, no prompt logging, and personal support. Offers Standard (gpt-oss-20b) and Premium (gpt-oss-120b) reasoning models, vision (Qwen3-VL-30B), OCR (LightOnOCR-2-1B), and embedding models (bge-m3, bge-reranker-v2-m3). Three packages (S/M/L) with monthly minimums from €250 to €1,000.
• IT Consulting Professional consulting services for cloud strategy, migration, hybrid-cloud design, compliance architecture, and workshops or training. Delivered by net.DE cloud architects from initial strategy through go-live support.

Quantifiable outcome

• 99.99% availability SLA for cloud infrastructure (vs. 99.9–99.99% typical hyperscaler SLA)
• +3 more outcomes

Named customers14 records

Segments3 records

Ideal customer profiles3 records

Technology focussed Yes

API detail

Has API

Yes

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

AI capability9 records

Feature7 records

Partnerships

Two partnerships are on record, tiered core and supporting.

• Wagner Group GmbHcoreTechnology or IntegrationWagner Group (Langenhagen, near Hannover) supplies advanced fire protection technology for net.DE's data centers DC-H2 and DC-H3. The system combines early smoke detection via laser technology with nitrogen gas flooding for residue-free fire suppression in IT environments. This is a critical safety infrastructure partnership directly supporting data center operations.
• enercitysupportingOthersenercity supplies supplementary green electricity ('Naturstrom') to complement net.DE's proprietary photovoltaic generation for operating its data centers with 100% renewable energy. This energy supply partnership ensures uninterrupted green power for all data center operations.

Scale indicators8 records

Recent moves6 records

Expansion highlights5 records

Direct peers

• Hetzner Online: German hosting and cloud provider operating its own data centers (Falkenstein, Nuremberg, Helsinki) with VPS, dedicated servers, storage and managed cloud offerings, marketing strongly on data residency, transparent pricing and no hyperscaler dependency — direct competitor for German Mittelstand cloud workloads.
• PlusServer: German managed hosting and cloud provider (acquired by IONOS in 2021) focused on managed servers, complex e-commerce platforms and cloud services for agencies and Mid-Market customers, with operations in DE-CIX-connected German data centers — a close peer in custom managed cloud for German enterprises.
• Wasabi Technologies: US-based S3-compatible object storage provider competing on 'no egress fees' pricing, similar to net.DE's S3 Object Storage free-egress model — directly comparable on the storage product line and pricing narrative.
• IONOS: Publicly listed German hosting and cloud provider (formerly 1&1 Internet) offering shared hosting, VPS, dedicated servers, managed cloud and a separate IONOS Cloud Compute stack from European data centers — directly competes for the same German SMB and Mid-Market cloud workloads.

Broad incumbents

• OVHcloud: European hyperscale-style cloud and bare-metal provider operating its own data centers (including Strasbourg and Limburg) with sovereign EU positioning, S3-compatible object storage and AI products — broader incumbent that overlaps with net.DE on sovereign cloud and bare-metal IaaS.
• Microsoft Azure (German Cloud / Sovereign Cloud): Hyperscale cloud with specific German/sovereign cloud regions and a partner network serving regulated enterprises — sets the competitive ceiling on capability breadth and establishes the very sovereignty-fragmentation narrative that net.DE monetizes.
• T-Systems / Open Telekom Cloud: Telekom Deutschland's enterprise cloud arm operating Open Telekom Cloud (an OpenStack-based IaaS) from German data centers with strong sovereignty and regulated-industry credentials — broad enterprise incumbent competing for the same German Mid-Market and public-sector contracts.
• Deutsche Telekom (Business / Magenta Cloud): Incumbent telecommunications provider offering sovereign cloud, managed services and colocation from German data centers to enterprise and public-sector buyers — overlaps with net.DE on consulting, connectivity and managed workloads in the German Mittelmarket.

Regional players

• Maincubes: European colocation operator with secure German and Dutch data centers (e.g., FRA01) offering colocation, cloud-connectivity and managed services — comparable on the physical-layer colocation and cloud-connect business that complements net.DE's hardware housing offering.

Emerging players

• STACKIT: Sovereign cloud and colocation business of the Schwarz Group (parent of Lidl/Kaufland), building German data centers with explicit 'no hyperscaler' and GDPR-first positioning — an emerging German sovereign-cloud competitor targeting regulated enterprises and public sector.

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses5 records

Competitive moat6 records

Key risks6 records

Key highlights7 records

Customer concentration

• Xx.com/isp_netDE

Compliance5 records

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles3 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about net.DE