Smals, the shared IT organization serving Belgian public institutions, has named Google Cloud as its main cloud provider. The deal will give Smals members access to Google Cloud services. – Sebastian Moss. Smals will integrate Google Cloud into its infrastructure strategy, alongside its existing on-premise systems, the governmental community cloud (G-Cloud), and a private cloud environment.
Smals members will also gain access to Google’s AI technologies, while retaining full operational control over environments hosted on Google Cloud.
“The addition of Google Cloud as a third pillar, alongside our community cloud and on-premise systems, gives member organisations greater technical flexibility,” said Dirk Deridder, CTO of Smals. This framework agreement enables us to meet particular workload needs in public administration while complying with established security and sovereignty requirements. “Google Cloud is supplying the necessary technology to back both Smals’ own ambitious AI initiatives and those of its members in Belgium,” added Kurt Rommens, head of Public Sector at Google Cloud Benelux.
Our priority is to provide a protected setting that complies with the portability and sovereignty requirements established by the Belgian federal government. Smals is a consortium comprising more than 230 Belgian public-sector organisations, notably in the fields of social security and healthcare.
According to its 2022 activity report, Smals operates three data center facilities in the Brussels region: two primary sites offering a combined net capacity of 2,112 sqm (22,760 sq ft) and a backup facility with 2,026 sqm (21,810 sq ft) of floor space. From these data centers, Smals provides data center-as-a-service and infrastructure-as-a-service solutions to the public sector.
In October 2025, Google announced plans to invest €2 billion ($2.2 billion) in cloud and AI infrastructure across Belgium over the next two years. The company opened its first Belgian data center campus in 2009, which hosts its europe-west1 region, and broke ground on a new campus in Farciennes, Hainaut province, in April 2024.
Official plans for the campus were initially revealed in July 2023. The Saint-Ghislain site marked Google’s first European campus, which the company has since expanded.
