Nearly nine in ten businesses (89%) could not migrate business-critical workloads away from their largest cloud or infrastructure provider within three weeks, according to the Leaseweb Digital Independence Survey 2026. Only 11% could make the move in that time, and 55% said it would take longer than three months or was not currently possible. The survey is notable because most of those firms also believe they are in control: 76% reported complete or high control over their ability to move data to another provider or environment.
Censuswide ran the research for Leaseweb among 800 C-suite leaders at organisations with 500 to 5,000 employees, 200 each in the UK, US, Germany and the Netherlands, between 22 and 30 September 2026. The Netherlands had the highest share expecting migration to take more than three months (65%), ahead of the UK (59%), the US (55%) and Germany (40%). Dutch respondents also gave the longest average estimate, at 4.7 months.
AI is expected to deepen the dependence. Overall, 79% expect AI to increase their reliance on a small number of providers over the next three years, including 89% in the US, 83% in the UK, 76% in Germany and 67% in the Netherlands. Meanwhile 78% have acted to reduce reliance on a particular technology or infrastructure provider in response to geopolitical pressure, including 91% in the US and 87% in the UK, and 45% plan to go further.
Independence has a price tag. Almost all respondents would pay more for greater control, less provider dependence or more freedom to move, and 73% would pay at least 11% more, with an average premium of about 16%. Willingness to pay was highest in the Netherlands, where 81% would pay at least 11% more and 26% at least 21% more, followed by Germany at 79%.
Compliance ranked lower than might be expected. Fewer than three in ten treat regulatory and legal compliance (28%) or security and data protection (28%) as non-negotiable when choosing a provider, and two-thirds (67%) would accept at least a minor trade-off on compliance. AI-related technology and provider dependence was the most commonly chosen barrier to digital independence overall (28%), although legacy-system complexity came first in Germany (30%).
Lex Boost, co-CEO at Leaseweb, said: "Digital independence comes down to having real choices, and our research shows many businesses have fewer than they think". He added: "Organisations may believe they control their data, but once applications have been built around a provider’s platform, moving them is rarely quick or simple".
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