The European Commission is to spend billions of Euros on developing new AI supercomputing clusters. Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced the launch of InvestAI, an initiative to mobilize €200 billion ($209bn) for investment in AI, including a new European fund of €20bn ($20.9bn) for large clusters it is calling AI gigafactories.
The EU's InvestAI fund will finance four future “AI gigafactories” across the EU. The systems will be tailored to training the “most complex, very large, AI models,” and be equipped with around 100,000 of the latest-generation AI chips.
Von der Leyen said: “AI will improve our healthcare, spur our research and innovation and boost our competitiveness. We want AI to be a force for good and for growth. We are doing this through our own European approach – based on openness, cooperation, and excellent talent. But our approach still needs to be supercharged.”
She continued: “This is why, together with our member states and with our partners, we will mobilize unprecedented capital through InvestAI for European AI gigafactories. This unique public-private partnership, akin to a CERN for AI, will enable all our scientists and companies - not just the biggest - to develop the most advanced very large models needed to make Europe an AI continent.”
