Google abandoned work on its Isolated Region cloud computing platform, a service being designed for use in countries and areas with strict data control regulations, Bloomberg reported.

Citing employees who had worked on the now abandoned project, the news website said the initiative had been initially targeted at China and dumped partly in response to geopolitical tensions. It also noted the Covid-19 (coronavirus) pandemic as a factor in the decision.

In comments later reported by Reuters, Google denied the project was closed due to either political issues or as a result of the pandemic, and was instead due to it finding “other approaches” to meeting conditions such as data governance.

It also clarified it does, and has not offered cloud services in China.

Isolated Region would have allowed companies and governments to use Google to set up specific, closed cloud services separated from the global tech giant’s other operations and under complete control of its customer.

It was apparently being designed for use in areas with strict data sovereignty rules, including China and the European Union.