IBM launches Sovereign Core software to help organisations address the digital sovereignty imperative

IBM has announced the launch of IBM Sovereign Core, which it describes as the industry’s first AI-ready, sovereign-enabled software designed to help enterprises, governments and service providers build, deploy and manage sovereign environments for AI workloads.

The new offering is aimed at organisations facing mounting pressure to retain control over their technology infrastructure amid tightening regulations, geopolitical considerations and growing governance requirements around AI. As AI adoption accelerates, particularly with large language models and agentic workflows processing sensitive data, the question of who controls data, infrastructure and operations has become central to enterprise strategy.

Beyond data residency

IBM said digital sovereignty extends well beyond data residency, encompassing operational control, access governance, workload execution and the jurisdiction under which AI models operate. However, many organisations currently lack a modern, compliant destination to re-host applications under sovereign control—especially AI-enabled applications with continuous compliance and audit requirements.

Industry analysts expect this challenge to intensify. Gartner predicts that more than 75% of enterprises will have a digital sovereignty strategy by 2030, often centred on sovereign cloud approaches.

“As AI adoption accelerates in India, businesses will need to innovate while meeting tightening regulatory requirements and controlling sensitive data and AI workloads,” said Sandip Patel, Managing Director, IBM India & South Asia. “IBM Sovereign Core provides an AI-ready sovereign stack that gives organisations control, compliance and operational autonomy, while remaining aligned with our open hybrid cloud strategy.”

Sovereignty built into software

Unlike solutions that layer sovereignty controls on top of existing architectures, IBM Sovereign Core is designed with sovereignty embedded at the software level. Built on Red Hat’s open-source foundations, the platform enables organisations to build and operate cloud-native and AI workloads entirely under their own authority and within chosen jurisdictions.

Key capabilities include a customer-operated control plane that allows organisations to manage deployments and configurations without external intervention, in-boundary identity and key management to keep authentication and encryption under local control, and continuous compliance reporting with auditable evidence generated and stored within the sovereign boundary.

The platform also supports governed AI inference, ensuring that AI models, GPU clusters and agent operations run locally with full traceability, without exporting data to external providers. IBM said the solution is designed for rapid deployment, allowing organisations to stand up isolated, multi-tenant sovereign environments within days, while retaining flexibility in hardware and infrastructure choices.

Addressing regulatory and geopolitical pressures

“The sovereign AI conversation has focused heavily on data residency, but that’s only part of the equation,” said Sanjeev Mohan, Principal at SanjMo. “The harder question is who controls the system—and whether that control can be proven to regulators. IBM Sovereign Core takes a holistic approach across data, operations, technology and assurance, which becomes essential as AI moves into production.”

Erik Fish, Director of Geotechnology at Eurasia Group, added that sovereignty concerns are rapidly shifting from theory to day-to-day operations. “Governments and enterprises must now demonstrate clear control over critical data and infrastructure as regulation and geopolitics increasingly converge,” he said.

Flexible deployment and partner ecosystem

IBM Sovereign Core can be deployed in customer-owned data centres, supported in-region cloud infrastructure, or through IT service providers. IBM is initially rolling out the solution in Europe through partnerships with Cegeka in Belgium and the Netherlands, and Computacenter in Germany, enabling local operational independence while giving service providers a sovereign AI platform to offer their clients.

“As compliance requirements become more complex, demand is growing for platforms that keep sensitive data within controlled boundaries,” said Gaetan Willems, VP Cloud & Digital Platforms at Cegeka. “A pre-architected sovereign solution allows us to deliver enterprise-ready software while meeting local regulations.”

According to Computacenter, the software-centric approach could significantly reduce deployment timelines. “Instead of assembling and validating sovereignty controls from scratch, we can focus on configuring the platform to specific use cases,” said Christian Schreiner, Unit Director Cloud at Computacenter. “That acceleration opens the door for clients who previously couldn’t consider AI at all.”

With Sovereign Core, IBM is positioning sovereignty not as a constraint on innovation, but as a foundational capability for organisations seeking to deploy AI at scale with confidence, compliance and long-term control.