EU Sovereignty Score
EU sovereignCAD & EngineeringHeadquarters: DE

HiCAD: sovereignty score and 8 European alternatives

HiCAD is a 2D/3D CAD system from ISD Software und Systeme GmbH, the ISD Group. It combines 2D and 3D design in one user interface and supports both free and parametric modelling. Industry-specific modules cover steel engineering, sheet-metal processing, plant engineering and mechanical engineering, and steel, sheet-metal and plant elements can sit in a single model. Drawings can be passed directly to NC machines. HiCAD reads and writes formats such as IFC, STEP, IGES, DWG and DXF. It is proprietary software for Windows, has a modular structure, and is built on ISD's own 3D kernel. ISD also offers HELiOS, a PDM/PLM system, and a free Education Edition of HiCAD.

ISD was founded in 1977 and has its headquarters and development in Dortmund, Germany, with subsidiaries in Switzerland, the Netherlands, Austria, France, Japan and Italy. The sources consulted do not name a parent company. They also do not describe a vendor-hosted HiCAD service, so where design data is stored depends on how the customer sets up the software.

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Sovereignty score
71 / 1000 = high exposure
100 = sovereign
  • Jurisdiction SOV-2100
    Headquartered in the EU: European law applies
  • Data residency SOV-3100
    EU-only hosting
  • Cryptographic key sovereignty SOV-360
    Key management with a European vendor
  • Freedom from lock-in SOV-640
    Closed source: switching requires data migration
  • Source & runtime sovereignty SOV-4 · SOV-655
    Closed source, runtime with the vendor

SOV codes: the matching objective in the European Commission's Cloud Sovereignty Framework. Official source

How the score is calculated

Facts and evidence

Last checked October 5, 2026
Headquarters
DE (EU)Verified by hand
Sovereignty model
Vendor-hosted (EU)Verified by hand
Data hosting
EUVerified by hand
Open-source
NoVerified by hand
GDPR-compliant
YesVendor-stated
Category
CAD & Engineering
Type
Product
Website
isdgroup.com ↗

How we verify · Something wrong? Suggest a correction

Top EU-based & GDPR-compliant alternatives to HiCAD

The European alternatives to HiCAD come from our knowledge base of over 6,800 vendors. We only list vendors headquartered in the EU or the EEA; fully European-owned vendors rank before vendors with a foreign owner. For each alternative you see the country, the open-source status and a short description.

Score per alternative: 0 = high exposure, 100 = sovereign

68 European CAD & Engineering vendors are in the catalogue. View the whole category · Submit an alternative · View category on the map

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Why digital sovereignty matters with HiCAD

HiCAD is headquartered in DE and therefore falls under European law: the GDPR, NIS2 and the Data Act. No foreign legislation can compel access to your data.

Data is hosted exclusively in the EU, so HiCAD scores best on data residency.

HiCAD is closed source and hosted by the vendor. The encryption keys and the runtime sit with the vendor and switching requires data migration. Ask about bring-your-own-key, export options and open standards.

What this means for your organisation depends on your whole stack and context. The free assessment weighs HiCAD together with your other vendors and gives a total score, a heatmap and the main risk drivers.

Frequently asked questions

What is the best European alternative to HiCAD?

It depends on your use case. Strong EU alternatives to HiCAD include ACCA software, ALLPLAN and AUCOTEC Engineering Base. On this page you can compare 8 EU alternatives by jurisdiction, data residency and open-source status.

Are there open-source alternatives to HiCAD?

Yes. Open-source EU alternatives to HiCAD include Blender. These keep your data fully under your own control and let you self-host if you want to.

Is HiCAD GDPR-compliant and where is the data hosted?

HiCAD is headquartered in DE (EU) and hosts data in EU. That makes HiCAD an EU-sovereign choice in its own right; the EU alternatives on this page are comparable European tools.

Details and sources

Verified by handHeadquarters, owner, hosting locations and licence have been checked by us against public sources. Free of charge and for every vendor, not a paid label. Nothing in this knowledge base is taken over automatically. Last checked on October 5, 2026.

Sources

Public sources used in the latest check of this record.

Compliance evidence

The links below point to the vendor's own public documents. We only record what we found: a missing link means "not found publicly", not "not compliant".

No public compliance evidence has been recorded for this vendor yet. Do you know its DPA or subprocessor list? Something wrong? Suggest a correction

Digital sovereignty in CAD & Engineering

CAD & Engineering: Computer-aided design, 3D modelling and engineering simulation software. In this category the choice of vendor determines who has legal access to your data, where that data lives and how easily you can switch later.

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8 European alternatives to HiCAD — GDPR-compliant & EU-hosted · EU Sovereignty Score