European Glean alternative for grown IT Infrastructures

Many companies are currently looking for GDPR-compliant ways to connect AI with internal company information. Added to this is the challenge that employees bring private AI tools to the workplace and there is no control over who uploads what data and where. At the time, Glean was one of the first companies—alongside amber—to use language models for retrieving internal company information. However, Glean serves a completely different target group than amber. In this article, we explain why amber is a Glean alternative you should definetly have a look at.

Quick comparison: amber vs. Glean

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  • amber: European enterprise platform focusing on internal company knowledge through AI search, automation, and AI assistance. At its core is a semantic index/vector approach (for precise retrieval) plus an action layer for system automation. Particularly strong in mature IT infrastructures. The focus target group is companies with standard solutions (e.g., M365, Salesforce, etc.) or European software solutions.

• • Glean: US AI solution that develops complex AI solutions for large companies with many individual IT tools.

Technical approaches amber vs. Glean

amber relies on its own semantic vector index with optimized AI retrieval logic and queries its own central index instead of third-party systems for searches – this delivers precise, consistent answers with fast runtimes, even in complex IT landscapes. Glean relies on a similar concept, but offers significantly more configuration options. Since Glean is typically used in large companies, it is usually administered by one or more employees. amber relies on preconfigured settings that do not require dedicated teams for implementation. In recent years, amber has focused primarily on developing features that help employees use AI quickly and, above all, intuitively in their everyday work.

Another strength of amber is the integration of cloud and on-premise solutions, especially with regard to European software providers. In addition, amber offers multi-channel access, e.g., via Teams app, Outlook, Chrome plug-in, desktop app, or mobile. amber benefits here from the fact that, as a European solution, it has a very sophisticated retrieval system not only in English but also in other languages, which ensures the quality of the high-quality knowledge provision for AI agents and employees.

History of amber

amber was founded in Aachen in 2020 to make internal company knowledge quickly and easily accessible with AI. The challenges that amber solves are mostly along these lines:

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   1. Grown IT infrastructures – IT infrastructures have grown over the years, with information scattered across drives, M365, Atlassian, DMS, or intranet.

1. 1. Knowledge carriers leave the company – the “remaining” employees face challenges in quickly accessing internal knowledge

1. 1. Processes & products are becoming more complex – employees must keep track of ever-increasing amounts of data

1. 1. Employees use private AI solutions – Employees are aware of the challenges mentioned above, which is why they use private AI tools to become more efficient.

While the fourth challenge only arose after the release of ChatGPT, we began addressing the first three challenges in 2020 with what is known as enterprise search. The initial goal was to build a kind of “internal Google” for the company. Amber’s focus was therefore initially on integrating a wide variety of software solutions.

amber differs from solutions such as Glean: As a standard solution, amber can be quickly and easily integrated into existing IT infrastructures. Glean requires significantly more effort to implement and configure, making it noticeably more expensive.

Similarities between amber & Glean

Both amber and Glean have the following similarities:

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  • Both platforms are ISO27001 certified and support GDPR-compliant use of AI functions.

• • Both offer AI assistants and agents that can be used to automate workflows and processes.

• • amber hosts all AI models in Europe in compliance with GDPR and allows bring-your-own-model; Glean also relies on high security standards, but according to American standards, and primarily uses US hyperscaler infrastructure for this purpose.

Differences between amber and Glean

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  • amber is operated in sovereign European clouds (T-Cloud), while Glean relies on US hyperscalers.

• • amber has developed its own, multilingual retrieval models

• • amber is particularly strong in hybrid landscapes with on-premise systems (VPN connection of file servers, DMS, Nextcloud, etc.), while Glean is primarily positioned for modern cloud stacks.

• • amber offers transparent, scalable pricing models, while Glean works with individual enterprise contracts and a more premium-oriented, user-based pricing logic.

• • amber offers significantly more comprehensive integrations with both on-premise and cloud solutions.

amber as a Glean alternative – the business impact

If you want to use AI sustainably, you will have no choice but to integrate it deeply into your core systems. In the future, it will become increasingly important to provide both employees and AI agents with the right knowledge. If you want fast results and standardized integration with workflow builders such as n8n & Co without a large project effort, amber is the right choice for you. Those who have highly customized IT landscapes and operate in the large enterprise segment, and therefore have their own teams to provide ongoing support for the solution, should rely on Glean.

The advantage of amber: faster, traceable decisions, fewer errors, and higher productivity—including sustainable knowledge management based on the right information.

Try amber

amber offers a free trial period (no credit card required) during which interested companies can get started quickly and invite colleagues:

Conclusion

If you are looking for a GDPR-compliant European alternative to Glean that can be implemented quickly and at a fair price, amber is the better choice. amber combines semantic AI search, assistance, and automation via its own index with deep on-premise and cloud integrations and consistent permissions. This allows internal knowledge and processes to flow together securely – decisions become faster and more reliable, productivity increases, and shadow IT decreases. Glean is a solid option for selected use cases, but it reaches its limits when heterogeneous company data needs to be embedded precisely, audibly, and seamlessly into existing systems across mature IT infrastructures. amber is the more robust choice for this: deeply integrated, enterprise-ready, and quick to deploy.

Don’t want to start right away and have more questions on why amber is the better altern