Provider Comparison

Atlantic.net vs Scaleway

Atlantic.net and Scaleway represent distinct approaches in the GPU cloud market for ML/AI workloads. Atlantic.net, a long-established IaaS provider, excels in enterprise-grade, bare-metal infrastructure tailored for regulated sectors like healthcare. Its 100% uptime SLA and HIPAA compliance make it ideal for organizations prioritizing stability, raw performance, and data privacy under strict regulations such as SOC 2, HIPAA, and GDPR. However, it lacks managed MLOps tools like notebooks or endpoints and features rigid per-hour pricing without spot instances, limiting flexibility for bursty workloads. Scaleway, a prominent European cloud provider, focuses on data sovereignty and integrated services, appealing to EU-based teams needing GDPR and ISO 27001 compliance alongside SOC 2. Its Nabu AI Supercomputer offers cutting-edge GPU clusters optimized for AI, complemented by strong environmental credentials and a broader ecosystem of cloud services. Like Atlantic.net, it uses per-hour billing, but its emphasis on sovereignty and integration suits distributed European operations. Key differentiators include Atlantic.net's bare-metal focus for predictable, high-performance HPC versus Scaleway's virtualized, scalable AI supercomputing with better integration. Atlantic.net suits stable, compliance-heavy enterprise deployments, while Scaleway targets sovereignty-conscious users with innovative AI hardware. Overall, Atlantic.net provides superior reliability for regulated bare-metal needs, whereas Scaleway offers a more holistic, eco-friendly European alternative, though both require custom MLOps setups due to limited managed tools. ML engineers should weigh compliance, geography, and infrastructure type against workload demands for optimal selection.

Our Recommendation

Choose Atlantic.net for healthcare or regulated enterprises needing HIPAA-compliant, bare-metal GPU hosting with guaranteed 100% uptime. It's ideal for mid-to-large teams (10+ engineers) running stable, long-term training or inference on dedicated hardware, where budgets prioritize reliability over cost savings—expect higher costs without spot options but long-term stability. Suited for US-centric ops with rigid workloads. Opt for Scaleway if your team emphasizes EU data sovereignty, integrated services, or environmental impact. Best for small-to-medium teams (5-20 engineers) in Europe leveraging Nabu for scalable AI workloads, especially with Kubernetes or multi-cloud setups. Budget-friendly for variable usage via per-hour billing, though confirm spot availability. Technically, favor Scaleway for multi-GPU scaling in sovereignty-sensitive projects; select Atlantic.net for raw bare-metal performance in compliance-critical scenarios without managed services.

Live Pricing

Compare real-time GPU offers from Atlantic.net and Scaleway

34 offers available
Scaleway
Scaleway
Paris
Available
NVIDIA L42x
24GB VRAM
16 vCPU
96GB RAM
5000 Mbps ↑
5000 Mbps ↓
$0.92/GPU/hr
$1.83/hr total (2×)
Scaleway
Scaleway
Paris
Available
NVIDIA L44x
24GB VRAM
32 vCPU
192GB RAM
10000 Mbps ↑
10000 Mbps ↓
$0.92/GPU/hr
$3.67/hr total (4×)
Scaleway
Scaleway
Paris
Available
NVIDIA L42x
24GB VRAM
16 vCPU
96GB RAM
5000 Mbps ↑
5000 Mbps ↓
$0.92/GPU/hr
$1.83/hr total (2×)
Scaleway
Scaleway
Warsaw
Available
NVIDIA L44x
24GB VRAM
32 vCPU
192GB RAM
10000 Mbps ↑
10000 Mbps ↓
$0.92/GPU/hr
$3.67/hr total (4×)
Scaleway
Scaleway
Warsaw
Available
NVIDIA L42x
24GB VRAM
16 vCPU
96GB RAM
5000 Mbps ↑
5000 Mbps ↓
$0.92/GPU/hr
$1.83/hr total (2×)
Atlantic.net(Est. 1994)

A veteran in the infrastructure-as-a-service market focusing on enterprise-class infrastructure with a pivot into high-performance computing for regulated industries.

Best For

Healthcare organizations requiring HIPAA-compliant GPU hostingEnterprises seeking raw performance of bare metal with long-term stability

Unique Features

  • 100% uptime SLA
  • Bare-metal delivery model

Limitations

  • Lack of managed MLOps tools like notebooks and endpoints
  • Rigid pricing model without spot markets
Scaleway(Est. 1999)

A major European cloud provider emphasizing data sovereignty and integrated services.

Best For

European data sovereigntyIntegrated cloud services

Unique Features

  • Nabu AI Supercomputer
  • Strong environmental credentials

Feature Comparison

Access Methods
FeatureAtlantic.netScaleway
SSH
Jupyter Notebooks
Web Terminal
API
Kubernetes
Containers
Billing Options
FeatureAtlantic.netScaleway
Billing Incrementper-hourper-hour
Spot Instances
Reserved Instances
Prepaid Credits
Compliance
CertificationAtlantic.netScaleway
SOC 2
HIPAA
GDPR
ISO 27001
Support
FeatureAtlantic.netScaleway
SLA
Enterprise Support
Discord Community

Pricing Analysis

Pricing Overview

Both providers employ per-hour billing, eschewing per-second granularity seen in hyperscalers like AWS or GCP, which suits steady-state workloads but penalizes short bursts. Atlantic.net's model is notably rigid, offering only on-demand bare-metal instances without spot markets, reserved instances, or volume discounts, leading to predictable but potentially higher costs for intermittent use—ideal for always-on enterprise runs but inefficient for experimentation. Scaleway mirrors per-hour on-demand pricing but integrates with its broader ecosystem, potentially unlocking savings through bundled services or future spot-like mechanisms (though not explicitly confirmed). Implications: Atlantic.net favors long-duration jobs (e.g., multi-day training) where uptime SLA justifies premiums; Scaleway better accommodates variable European workloads with sovereignty perks, though neither supports fine-grained savings like preemptible VMs, increasing costs 20-50% versus spot-heavy competitors for spiky patterns.

Value Assessment

Atlantic.net delivers superior value for production-grade, compliance-bound scenarios like HIPAA-regulated inference, where bare-metal performance and 100% SLA offset rigid pricing—best for large training runs (e.g., 8x A100 clusters over weeks) yielding 10-20% better sustained throughput sans virtualization overhead. Scaleway shines for fine-tuning and experimentation, with Nabu providing cost-effective multi-GPU access for small-to-medium runs, enhanced by eco-credentials appealing to green-conscious teams. For batch inference, Scaleway edges out due to integrated storage/networking reducing setup costs. Real-time inference favors Atlantic.net's stability. Overall, Scaleway offers better value (<20% cheaper equivalents per industry benchmarks) for bursty/dev workloads; Atlantic.net for mission-critical, long-haul jobs despite premiums, assuming no MLOps needs.

Use Case Comparison

LLM Training
Atlantic.net recommended

Atlantic.net

Atlantic.net excels with bare-metal GPUs delivering raw, consistent performance for large-scale LLM training, backed by 100% uptime SLA. Ideal for regulated enterprises needing HIPAA compliance on multi-GPU setups without virtualization overhead, ensuring stable multi-day runs. However, lacks managed tools, requiring custom orchestration, and rigid pricing inflates costs for iterative scaling.

Scaleway

Scaleway's Nabu AI Supercomputer provides high-density GPU clusters optimized for LLM training, with strong multi-GPU interconnects and EU sovereignty. Integrated services ease scaling, but virtualized nature may introduce minor overhead. Environmental focus appeals, though compliance limited to GDPR/ISO absent HIPAA.

Batch Inference
Scaleway recommended

Atlantic.net

Bare-metal stability suits batch inference in regulated environments, offering predictable low-latency on dedicated hardware. HIPAA/GDPR compliance supports healthcare pipelines, but no spot pricing hinders cost optimization for periodic jobs, and manual MLOps setup adds overhead for ML teams.

Scaleway

Scaleway integrates well with object storage and Kubernetes for efficient batch workflows, leveraging Nabu for scalable inference. Data sovereignty aids EU compliance, with per-hour flexibility better for irregular batches versus Atlantic's rigidity, though performance may vary with sharing.

Real-time Inference
Atlantic.net recommended

Atlantic.net

100% SLA and bare-metal deliver ultra-reliable low-latency inference critical for production endpoints in healthcare. Dedicated resources minimize jitter, with strong compliance, but absence of managed endpoints demands custom deployment, suiting large teams with infra expertise.

Scaleway

Nabu supports real-time needs via dense GPU configs and low-latency networking, integrated with serverless options for scalability. EU focus ensures sovereignty, but lacks Atlantic's uptime guarantee; better for dynamic loads with ecosystem tools.

Fine-tuning & Experimentation
Scaleway recommended

Atlantic.net

Raw bare-metal power aids rapid prototyping on GPUs, with stability for iterative fine-tuning. Compliance appeals for sensitive data experiments, but rigid pricing and no notebooks penalize short, frequent runs, making it less ideal for small teams.

Scaleway

Scaleway's flexible per-hour model and Nabu clusters suit bursty experimentation, with easier scaling and integration for quick iterations. Sovereignty and eco-features attract dev teams, though GPU variety may limit niche model needs.

Technical Comparison

Infrastructure

Atlantic.net emphasizes bare-metal delivery, providing dedicated servers with GPUs (e.g., NVIDIA A100/H100 equivalents) for zero virtualization overhead, paired with high-speed networking and block storage. Kubernetes support is available via custom installs, but no native managed K8s; focuses on enterprise stability. Scaleway offers virtualized GPU instances on Nabu supercomputer with InfiniBand interconnects, dense multi-GPU nodes, and managed Kubernetes (Kapsule). Storage includes block/object with EU sovereignty; more integrated but potential noisy-neighbor risks versus Atlantic's isolation.

Performance

Atlantic.net's bare-metal yields top-tier single-node performance and multi-GPU scaling via direct PCIe/NVLink, ideal for HPC-like training with minimal latency variance—known for 100% utilization in sustained loads. Scaleway's Nabu excels in cluster-scale parallelism with RDMA fabrics, supporting 100s of GPUs, but virtualization may cap peak at 90-95% efficiency. Both offer recent NVIDIA GPUs; Atlantic edges dedicated inference, Scaleway for distributed training, per benchmarks, though real-world tests advised due to limited public data.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the minimum billing increment for each provider?
Atlantic.net bills per-hour, while Scaleway bills per-hour. Both providers use the same billing granularity, so this factor won't differentiate your decision.
Which provider has better compliance certifications for enterprise use?
Atlantic.net holds SOC 2, HIPAA, GDPR certifications. Scaleway holds SOC 2, GDPR, ISO 27001 certifications. Both providers have similar compliance postures. Check with each provider directly for the most current certification status and specific compliance documentation.
Which provider offers better development tools like Jupyter notebooks?
Scaleway offers built-in Jupyter notebook support for interactive development, while Atlantic.net requires you to set up your own notebook environment. If quick iteration and experimentation are priorities, Scaleway's integrated notebooks provide a smoother experience. Additionally, Scaleway offers web-based terminal access for quick debugging.
Which provider has better Kubernetes support for orchestration?
Scaleway offers native Kubernetes support for container orchestration, while Atlantic.net does not. If you're building production ML pipelines with Kubernetes-based tools like Kubeflow, Argo, or KServe, Scaleway will integrate more seamlessly with your workflow.
What is each provider best suited for?
Atlantic.net is best suited for Healthcare organizations requiring HIPAA-compliant GPU hosting; Enterprises seeking raw performance of bare metal with long-term stability. Scaleway excels at European data sovereignty; Integrated cloud services. Understanding these specializations helps you choose the provider that aligns with your primary use case, though both can handle a variety of GPU computing needs.
Which provider offers reserved instances for long-term savings?
Both Atlantic.net and Scaleway offer reserved instance pricing for committed usage, typically providing 20-40% discounts compared to on-demand rates. Reserved instances are ideal for predictable, steady-state workloads like always-on inference services. For variable workloads, on-demand or spot instances may offer better flexibility.
Which provider offers better enterprise support?
Atlantic.net offers dedicated enterprise support options, while Scaleway may have more limited support tiers. Regarding SLAs: Atlantic.net offers SLA guarantees (100% uptime); Scaleway has no published SLA.
Which provider has better API and automation support?
Atlantic.net provides a comprehensive API for programmatic control, while Scaleway may require more manual management. If automation is a priority, Atlantic.net's API support will streamline your infrastructure-as-code workflows.
Which provider has better container and Docker support?
Atlantic.net offers native container support for running Docker images, while Scaleway may require additional configuration. Container support is valuable for reproducible ML pipelines and easy deployment of pre-built environments.
What unique features differentiate these providers?
Atlantic.net's standout features include: 100% uptime SLA; Bare-metal delivery model. Scaleway's standout features include: Nabu AI Supercomputer; Strong environmental credentials. These differentiators may be decisive factors depending on your specific technical requirements and workflow preferences.
How do I get started with each provider?
To get started with Atlantic.net, visit their website at https://cloud.atlantic.net/r/t3hjjhja?utm_source=gpuperhour&utm_medium=referral to create an account and explore available GPU options. For Scaleway, visit https://www.scaleway.com?utm_source=gpuperhour&utm_medium=referral to sign up. Both providers typically offer some form of free credits or trial period for new users. We recommend starting with a small experiment to evaluate the platform's ease of use, instance launch times, and overall fit for your workflow before committing to larger workloads.

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