NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang’s persistent advocacy for “sovereign AI” is gaining significant traction across Europe, as leaders increasingly recognize the imperative for the continent to develop and control its own artificial intelligence infrastructure. Huang’s recent tour through major European capitals, including London, Paris, and Berlin, has highlighted the region’s existing AI infrastructure deficit while announcing key partnerships aimed at fostering local AI capabilities.
The concept of “sovereign AI” is rooted in the belief that each region’s unique language, knowledge, history, and culture necessitate the development and ownership of its own AI technologies. This vision resonates deeply in Europe, where there’s a growing apprehension about the continent’s reliance on a limited number of U.S. tech giants for crucial cloud infrastructure.
During his visit, Huang underscored NVIDIA’s commitment to the region. “We are going to invest billions in here,” Huang declared on Wednesday in Paris, while also urging swift action, adding, “but Europe needs to move into AI quickly.”
European leaders are indeed responding with concrete initiatives. On Monday of last week, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer announced a substantial £1 billion ($1.35 billion) in funding dedicated to scaling up computing power. This investment is part of a broader national effort to ensure the UK is “an AI maker and not an AI taker” in the global race for technological supremacy.
French President Emmanuel Macron, speaking at VivaTech, one of the world’s largest tech conferences, passionately termed building AI infrastructure “our fight for sovereignty.” In Germany, following NVIDIA’s announcement of plans to build an AI cloud platform in collaboration with Deutsche Telekom, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz hailed the move as an “important step” for the digital sovereignty and economic future of Europe’s leading economy.
Despite these promising developments, Europe currently lags behind both the U.S. and China in AI infrastructure, with much of its cloud services managed by dominant U.S. players like Microsoft, Amazon, and Alphabet’s Google. The continent also possesses only a handful of smaller AI companies, such as Mistral, that can rival their American counterparts.
However, a spirit of ambition is palpable. Arthur Mensch, the 31-year-old CEO of Mistral, articulated this vision at a VivaTech panel alongside Huang. “There’s no reason why Europe shouldn’t have tech champions,” Mensch asserted, calling the aspiration a “gigantic dream.” This sentiment reflects a growing determination across Europe to cultivate its own AI champions and secure its place at the forefront of the global AI landscape.
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