ChatGPT vs Claude vs private alternatives: comparison for businesses

Why a comparison matters

European businesses have an increasingly wide choice of AI tools, but not all are equivalent in terms of privacy, compliance and control. This comparison helps choose the right solution.

The comparison: ChatGPT vs Claude vs Gemini vs ORCA

Feature	ChatGPT (OpenAI)	Claude (Anthropic)	Gemini (Google)	ORCA (HT-X)
Where data runs	OpenAI servers (USA)	Anthropic servers (USA)	Google servers (USA/EU)	Company servers
GDPR	DPA available	DPA available	DPA available	Compliant by design
AI Act	Partial compliance	Partial compliance	Partial compliance	Compliant by design
Data sovereignty	No	No	Partial (EU regions)	Total
Models	GPT-5.4	Claude 4.6 (Opus, Sonnet)	Gemini 3.1 Pro/Flash	Llama 3, Mistral, DeepSeek R1, Qwen 3.5, GLM 5, Kimi 2.5
Open-source	No	No	No	Yes
Cost	Per user/token	Per user/token	Per user/token	Fixed
Customisation	Limited	Limited	Limited	Full
Vendor lock-in	High	High	High	None
Offline	No	No	No	Yes

Enterprise versions: are they enough?

ChatGPT Enterprise, Claude for Business and Gemini Advanced for Business offer additional guarantees:

• DPA with European terms
• No training on business data
• SSO and user management
• Audit logs of conversations

But concerns remain:

• Data still passes through provider servers
• Provider can change models unilaterally
• No control over underlying infrastructure
• Dependency on a non-European provider
• Costs that grow linearly with user count

When to choose what

Choose ChatGPT/Claude/Gemini if:

• You don’t process personal or sensitive data
• You have few users (< 20)
• You have no data sovereignty requirements
• You want to start quickly without infrastructure

Choose ORCA (on-premise) if:

• You process health, financial or personal data
• You must strictly comply with GDPR and AI Act
• You have 20+ users (lower total cost)
• You want total control over models and data
• You operate in regulated sectors

The open-source advantage

The open-source models used by ORCA — Llama 3, Mistral, DeepSeek R1, Qwen 3.5, GLM 5, Kimi 2.5 — in 2026 have reached comparable performance to proprietary models for most business tasks:

• Document analysis and synthesis: equivalent performance
• Text generation: excellent with Mistral and Qwen 3.5
• Coding: DeepSeek R1 and GLM 5 compete directly with GPT-4
• Complex reasoning: Qwen 3.5, Kimi 2.5 and 70B+ models rival the best proprietary ones
• Long context: Kimi 2.5 handles extended contexts, ideal for analysing large documents

The decisive advantage: total transparency on model operation, a fundamental requirement for AI Act compliance.

The choice for European businesses

HT-X helps businesses evaluate the right solution, with a free assessment including comparative testing on real company data.