And don't get me wrong: there's nothing wrong with starting a business rebranding Nextcloud and keeping your development closed source, as long as you're honest about that, which this initiative is not.
If you're looking for a Nextcloud hoster, there's a long list of partners here [2] that have contractually obligated themselves to contribute back to Nextcloud for every user they onboard.
I thought Nextcloud was released under the AGPL, making this very much not okay by default. So either I misunderstood something or Office.eu got a permission to make non-free modifications? (Going by what you said; I have not dived into this.)
Surely you mean "Microsoft 365 Copilot"?
(I am not making this up. That is what it is called now.)
Realistically, though, I think pretty much _all_ office suites have been called [Something] Office, for about the last 30 years. The Google one ("Google Workplace", formerly "Google Apps") is the only exception I can think of, and I wouldn't necessarily take Google's lead in software branding (honestly, until I looked it up for this post, I thought it was still called Google Apps, and I use the damn thing every day).
See for example: https://www.theverge.com/tech/856149/microsoft-365-office-re... or https://www.forbes.com/sites/zakdoffman/2026/01/11/office-is...
Microsoft Office still exists, the current version being Microsoft Office 2024 for Mac & Windows. But THIS Office is the the non-subscription version of Office, this is not the cloud-connected Apps being offered via Microsoft 365. This version of Office doesn't get all the latest cloud features and stuff happening in the subscription versions.
The cloud version of Office meanwhile is being renamed left and right. The office.com homepage now redirects to Copilot and is rebranded as Microsoft 365 Copilot just like you said. If you have any M365 business or enterprise plan Office is actually called "Microsoft 365 apps for business/enterprise".
Now why the Microsoft marketing team is adamant on changing and mucking about with such a long standing brand as "Microsoft Office" nobody understands.
One thing that may contribute to Europe's and the world's independence from Office is the notion that it's no longer a term distinctly associated with a Microsoft product.
I don't entirely disagree though because they could have attached some distinguishing prefix or suffix. Maybe that's what the .eu is.
You can't tell me there isn't a few turbo-nerds somewhere in the entire continent of europe that will find the intersection of 6-7 languages to name an EU groupware suite.
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/microsoft-offi...
"Office is now Microsoft 365, the premier productivity suite with innovative productivity apps, intelligent cloud services, and world-class security. Office.com, the Office mobile app, and the Office app for Windows are combined in the Microsoft 365 Copilot app—with a new icon, new look, and even more features."
You can count on Microsoft to mess up their marketing message in the craziest ways. Why stick with the best-known productivity software brand on the planet when you can call it "365 Copilot"?
Something like "EuropaOffice" would have followed the historical pattern so it's specifically the lack of an additional qualifier word that's perhaps questionable, not the word "Office."
But it does look like it's always called "Office.EU" in branding so maybe that's enough?
There's a bit of an issue with the overload of 'office' in the political context, this being an EU initiative and domain but other than that I say good call.
I mostly interact with smaller contributors to their field, and they tend to be unique and bold, because that's what is needed to be competitive. When they get their uniqueness and boldness out of just being who they are, it doesn't tend to foster the type of uniqueness and boldness needed to make a good product.
It is going to be pleasant? No, and it is going to take a few decades, however we cannot afford to have kill switches in the hands of foreign nations, even if their software is the best in the planet.
Frankly, right now, there is a lot of money to be made in just providing safer alternatives to American cloud stuff. They don't need to be _better_, they just need to be based in a stable jurisdiction.
With your average 18-24 year old swimming in Google Docs, Notion, Monday, Airtable and a dozen others..."Office" will belong to the EU in no time.
More seriously, Office is a great word for what the software package does, and it can't be trademarked. You can have Microsoft Office, Libre Office, and Europa Office.
What is Office EU?
Office EU is a European productivity suite for files, email, calendars, documents and calls, built on Nextcloud Hub. It brings Files, Talk, Groupware and Office together in one platform.
Mostly adding this because I wasn't sure if it was a new product or not based on a first glance over the Office EU site. Nextcloud offers recommendations for providers on their site, most of which are in the EU [0]. The Office EU website seems to be new since around January of this year [1]. More managed hosts for Nextcloud is a good thing in my book, but I'd be a bit wary to host my stuff with a brand new provider.
[0]: https://nextcloud.com/providers/
[1]: https://web.archive.org/web/20260116234614/https://office.eu...
Regardless of the Nextcloud issue. It's probably just a web wrapper then.
This seems untrustworthy, double so for a product that claims to prioritize transparency.
> Our headquarters are in The Netherlands (The Hague). Contact us to book a meeting or ask any questions.
source: https://office.eu/contact
> Office.EU is a service offered and operated by EUfforic Europe BV, registered with the Dutch chamber of commerce under registration number 98746243 and having its address at Dr. Kuyperstraat 10-A at (2514 BB) The Hague, the Netherlands.
[1]: Link to PDF, no HTML version: https://hel1.your-objectstorage.com/officeeuaa001/officeeu-p...
"The Premium and Ultimate plans offer EU Talk for larger meetings up to ● users."
https://www.nbim.no/no/investeringene/investeringsoversikt/#...
It's hard to get numbers on what countries pay to Microsoft. The Dutch parliament has repeatedly asked and has not gotten numbers even though there is a whole agency since 2014 (https://www.digitaleoverheid.nl/overzicht-van-alle-onderwerp...) specifically for giving Microsoft preferential treatment in procurement.
I'm european and can still easily confuse the "European Union" and "Europe the general area" when context is lacking, it's not a big stretch of the imagination for me that people _anywhere_ could construe this as "official" as well.
All that it looks like is backed by some emanation from the city of The Hague. No mention of the EU proper. It's european owned and backed, sure, but not EU owned and backed.
Tsh, marketing. (see Bill Hicks on marketing).
Issue is.. if you are a traditional MS Office "poweruser", the last thing you want to do is spend your days in a web browser. These apps should also be available as native apps, similar to MS Word, Excel, Pages, Keynote, etc.
I have a non-technical friend in finance who uses the Desktop versions of Excel for most of their work and they say it crashes nearly every day losing work.
As a "poweruser", I'd rather prefer to have all software available in the browser, open source, and hackable, than a native-based COM-ridden turd that only became more bloated and slow over the last couple of decades. (Yeah, and don't forget Ribbon UI!)
Unfortunately, Office EU is about politics, and not about hackable open-source software available with a single click.
Edit: I am certain this is one or two people vibe coding then will pitch to VCs when the waitlist has 1000 people.
Listing major company logos in their banner: “The organizations listed here use similar technology (Nextcloud) as part of their operations. Their inclusion is for illustrative purposes only.”
https://office.eu/images/social-proof/tu-berlin.svg https://office.eu/images/social-proof/itzbund.svg
Of which, Files, Talk, Office and Groupware are all just NextCloud services where they've swapped "Nextcloud" for "EU" in the name.
>"Office.EU is a service offered and operated by EUfforic Europe BV, registered with the Dutch chamber of commerce under registration number 98746243 and having its address at Dr. Kuyperstraat 10-A at (2514 BB) The Hague, the Netherlands."
I wouldn't personally trust a company that appears to be claiming another company's services as some revolutionary new thing, when it's just reselling them. And it was registered in November 2025 with no other information available - why would anyone gamble all their company data on a company that has appeared as quickly as it might disappear? Who are the owners/founders even?
Anyway, this was a waste of time.
e.g.:
- https://hostingdiscussion.com/news/european-cloud-workspace-...
- https://www.jornaldenegocios.pt/empresas/amp/plataforma-offi...
And it seems to be repackaged Collabora (~LibreOffice):
Be careful.
> What are the pricing plans?
> Office EU will offer simple plans for individuals and teams. Pricing will be competitive and designed to be easy to understand. We will publish full plan details closer to launch.
> Will there be a free plan?
> A free plan is planned after launch. It will be a good way to try Office EU before committing. Exact limits and features will be shared when it is ready.
That's also why always-connected SaaS is winning - it makes more things the vendor's problem instead of the customer's problem. Provided that you maintain a good relationship with your vendor. A metal machining company doesn't want to hire an employee to manage a bespoke computer system, or even to replace computer parts or install Ethernet cabling in the building. They might do it, if it's the only good option, but they prefer it to just work without effort, even for more money.
3 Reasons: - a significant investment from the Schwarz Group - not just a marketing stunt, but a company with a long term vision to compete with big US tech - clearly targeted at B2B with strong ties into EU politics
It even works perfectly with Consent-O-Matic extension.
https://www.wordperfect.com/en/
https://www.infomaniak.com/en/ksuite
https://www.hancomdocs.com/en/
But I work in IT and Office 365 is not "Office suite online" anymore. Office 365 started with running Exchange in the cloud by MS as it is a PITA for IT. That was basically it.
Office 365 is now:
- Office suite, both online and desktop apps (Vital for full feature Excel)
- Entra for Users, Groups and Policy, SSO, conditional access, MFA (Entra is actually Azure AD, not sure if this is still the case but all Office 365 get an Azure AD tenant it runs on)
- Device management via Intune, that is policy, push apps/installs, reinstalls, Autopilot, run scripts etc on machines, device state config
- File sharing with Sharepoint & Teams & personal Onedrive (this also adds endpoint backup)
- Teams - chat, video, workspace - We live in Teams at work.
- Email (that includes admin, extensive admin)
- DLP - Data loss prevention
- The power suite where users & admins can make their own apps
+ MS Graph API for all this
Oh, and it comes with Copilot chat baked in (GTP 5.3 based now) with enterprise controls.
At a big company you can have people ONLY working on the Entra part to secure user accounts. Or people ONLY on Intune to setup and manage PCs, policy etc.
Office 365 is a beast and I will argue GSuite does not match up as companies basically HAVE to buy Slack on the side to get parity. Also sysadmin on GSuite sucks.
The link actually made me laugh but also sad. It is frankly embarrassing. We in EU can do tech Spotify, Klarna, Lovable, Mojang, Dice, Arelion, Ericsson and this is only in Sweden. Look at a 4G network, it is insanley complex.
So yea not sure what the solution is. But this is too little too late. It should have started in 2008 maybe they would have a chance. It is also sheer numbers. MS is massive and Azure/O365 is their cash cow now. They make sure it is damn good.
What we need to get independent is the public infrastructures.
That has nothing to do with current tensions between Europe and the US.
It’s just unbecoming of a nation to depend in its core on the good will of another.
As for open source as they claim ... can't find the code or a link to it on their site.
So far this smells like a lot of intent but I'm not sure what this is.
Surely, Notion showed us that there are better working models.
Seems a misstep to list an American AI provider first...
That'll show those pesky Americans.
The enormous momentum of the installed base and occupied headspace of Microsoft systems made them lazy and complacent decades ago. They have been peddling insecure unreliable software for a generation now, and believed their was no viable threat.
It took too long, but finally. Trump and his mad bad actions are good for the Europeans like a heart attack is good for your health
rework it into a web friendly version.
what requirements does the EU have for not using libre office?
I was also looking at infomaniak.com .
I'm trying to move away from MS 365 myself, both because of Trump, AI but also because Microsoft keeps making it work worse and worse with Firefox. The latest thing (as of a day or 2 ago) is every 30 minutes redirecting my outlook web to the "You just signed out of your account" page :( So I have to sign back in every time I use it, it used to simply stay open (and no settings were changed on the backend). How I hate these guys.
The most annoying thing is that none of this happens when I set my user agent to MS Edge on Windows. So they are purposefully breaking this.
One thing this whole current shit show says is geopolitics are too unstable to put your data into any system or legal jurisdiction you don’t directly control.
From: https://amsterdam.raadsinformatie.nl/document/16563456/1/Mee... (which is not the Hague, but Amsterdam)
>1.1 Introductie >Op 28 maart 2024 heeft de gemeenteraad van Amsterdam unaniem ingestemd met het (gewijzigde) initiatiefvoorstel Amsterdam Digitaal Onafhankelijk van raadslid IJmker
English:
>On March 28, 2024, the Amsterdam City Council unanimously approved the (amended) initiative proposal Amsterdam Digital Independent by Council Member IJmker
During the MS-DOS => Windows transitions, some folks moved from doing xBase development into VB, or Access, instead of CA Objects or FoxPro.
> but for quick-and-dirty custom applications it's still the easiest platform out there.
So I'm a big LLM sceptic. Seriously, you can check. But if there is one thing that LLMs _are_ quite good at, it is the sort of quick and (very) dirty custom CRUD apps traditionally produced with Access.
With the university who trained these politicians, with the institutions who shaped them, with these politicians who created this multi-crisis - believing everyone out there was invested in a stable world as they were- a independent Europe is not possible. They just have to much hackable surface, to much API, they will crawl before any hacker offering them a way "back out" with the decades to come.
Join waitinglist. For a web app of Google docs.
You don't see how pathetic this rebrand of Nextcloud is?
It is practically a scam.
Minor gripe: cookie notice despite using only required first-party cookies. You’re from here, come on, go read the GDPR!
