AGPL and cloud providers

Question

Let's say that you are a service provider (like AWS, Google Cloud, DigitalOcean, Heroku for example) and you decide to offer a database that is licensed under the AGPL as a managed service.

1. Do you need to release only the modifications made to the AGPL software (the database)?

2. Do you need to release also the code that you use to "manage" that software (launch new instances, backups, updates, etc.)?

3. Or you need to release the code of your entire platform?

In my opinion the expression "if you modify the Program" only refers to the first point (which is the most intuitive interpretation), but I would also like to hear your opinion.

Answer 1

Cloud Service Providers would have no issue with providing an AGPL-licensed database for their customers. The only thing they would need to do is provide to their customers any changes to the source code (item 1 in your question).

Based on the AGPL license of the database, Cloud Service Providers would not need to provide source code of any of their underlying software (launch new instances, backups, updates, etc.), nor the code of their entire cloud management platform (items 2 and 3 in your question).

The customers of the Cloud Service Providers, however, usually prefer services, which are under a permissive license. That's why Amazon for example forked Elastic Search, to avoid forcing their customers to use software under SSPL.