Who Owns Your Software Now?

On Sunday, the European Commission was told to get on with it. A coalition of European publishers, tech firms and startups wrote to EU antitrust regulators demanding they wrap up a two-year probe into Google favouring its own services in search results. They want a fine. They want a cease-and-desist order. They are tired of waiting.

Meanwhile, back in Westminster, the House of Commons Library published a research briefing on digital sovereignty. Not a blog post. Not a tweet. A formal parliamentary briefing. The kind of document that civil servants read before writing policy. It covers the UK's dependency on foreign tech companies, the government's reluctance to favour domestic providers in procurement, and the growing pressure from MPs and peers to do something about it.

The UK's Cyber Security and Resilience Bill is progressing through Parliament. It will bring data centres, managed service providers, and supply chains under mandatory cyber security obligations for the first time. About 900 to 1,100 managed service providers will be caught. Many have never been regulated.

All of which makes this a reasonable week to ask: who actually owns the software your business runs on?

We found twelve more answers.

This week on alternatives-in.uk

HostPresto - Web hosting, email hosting, domains (alternative to GoDaddy, Gmail) Own and operate all their infrastructure from a data centre in Kent. No reselling. 100% renewable energy, certified by The Green Web Foundation. Partnered with Ecologi for tree planting. TrustPilot rated. Free migrations, no contracts. They have been doing this since 2002, back when the company was called Dream Hosting. Twenty-four years of independence.

OpenCRM - CRM (alternative to HubSpot, Salesforce) All data hosted in the UK. Full-featured CRM with sales pipeline, marketing automation, project management, and help desk. No tiered feature gating. Every plan gets everything. Based in Catterick Garrison, which is a military town in the Dales. About as far from Silicon Valley as you can get.

34SP.com -- WordPress hosting (alternative to GoDaddy, WP Engine) - Founded in 2000. Twenty-six years old and still independently owned by the same two people. Self-describes as "fiercely independent" and they have the receipts. RIPE NCC member. UK data centres. UK support team, no automated phone systems. Donates 10% of hosting capacity free to UK charities. Northern Quarter, Manchester. Fiercely is the right word.

BackupVault - Cloud backup (alternative to Backblaze, Carbonite, CrashPlan) - Data stored at Equinix facilities in Slough and Reading. 256-bit AES GCM encryption with customer-held keys. ISO 9001 and ISO 27001 certified. Backs up Microsoft 365, Google Workspace, Dynamics 365, Salesforce, and Entra ID. Founded 2004. If you keep your data in American clouds, you are relying on American legal frameworks. BackupVault keeps your backups in the UK under UK law. Simple proposition. Surprisingly rare.

Cookie Control by CIVIC -- Consent management (alternative to OneTrust, Cookiebot) Edinburgh. Founded 2001. Cookie Control has been running since 2012. Google-certified CMP. IAB Europe certified. WCAG 2.2 AA compliant. Listed on the UK Government Digital Marketplace. Named in the Tussell Tech200 as one of the fastest-growing tech companies in the UK public sector. Used by the ICO itself. When the Information Commissioner's Office uses your cookie consent tool, that is a reference that speaks for itself.

Workbooks CRM - CRM and business management (alternative to Salesforce, HubSpot) - The ownership chain runs through a standard Bidco/Topco structure, but every entity is UK-registered. This is what a British acquisition looks like when the buyer is also British. Extends beyond pure CRM into order management, invoicing, and supplier management. Mid-market focus.

Cezanne HR - HR software (alternative to BambooHR, Workday, Sage HR) NorthEdge is genuinely UK-owned. Cezanne covers 120 countries, 11 languages, and includes payroll, performance management, recruitment, time tracking, and expenses. If you are using BambooHR, your HR data is in America. Cezanne keeps it here.

ShopWired - E-commerce platform (alternative to Shopify, BigCommerce) - ShopWired is what happens when someone builds a Shopify competitor and does not sell it. 40+ UK payment gateway integrations. B2B wholesale features. Royal Mail Click and Drop. Advanced VAT handling for UK and EU. If you are a UK retailer on Shopify, your commerce data sits in Ottawa. ShopWired keeps it in Britain.

Orlo - Social media management (alternative to Hootsuite, Buffer, Sprout Social) - 400+ public sector organisations use it, including local councils, police forces, NHS trusts, and transport authorities. Supports Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, X, TikTok, YouTube, Nextdoor, Bluesky, WhatsApp, and Threads. Self-describes as "the only UK-based social media management platform." After our research, we have not found evidence to the contrary.

FreeAgent - Accounting software (alternative to Xero, QuickBooks Online) - Edinburgh. Over 200,000 users. Free to NatWest, RBS, and Ulster Bank business current account holders. Built-in payroll. MTD-compatible VAT filing. Self Assessment. If your accountant is not using this, ask them why.

Screaming Frog SEO Spider - SEO auditing (alternative to Ahrefs, SEMrush) - Bootstrapped. No VC. No acquisition in sixteen years. The SEO Spider is a desktop application, which means your data never leaves your machine. There is no cloud. There is no third-party server. You download it, you run it, the data stays with you. In a world of SaaS surveillance, that is quietly radical.

ProdPad - Product management (alternative to Aha!, Productboard) - Bootstrapped and unfunded. Janna also co-founded Mind The Product, the world's largest product management community. SOC2 Type II compliant. Cyber Essentials certified. Used by thousands of product teams. If you work in product management, you probably already know who Janna Bastow is. Now you know her company is British-owned.