Thereby Ursula von der Leyen is responding to the U.S. government, which has criticized the EU for stifling innovation with unnecessary regulation.
The European Commission specifically proposes that the EU, and thereby its member states, contribute 50 billion euros, while the remaining funds should come from “investors and industry.” The total goal is 200 billion euros, equivalent to nearly 1,500 billion Danish kroner. The funds will be used, among other things, to build new “AI gigafactories” in Europe, which, according to the Commission, should create a “thriving European ecosystem for training advanced AI models and developing AI solutions.” These factories will be built around the EU’s network of European supercomputers for high-performance computing (HPC).
Von der Leyen also participated in the AI summit in Paris, where she dismissed criticism from U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance:
“I often hear that the EU is too late because the U.S. and China were first. I disagree. The AI race is far from over. AI is only now being implemented in our businesses and across sectors. This should be the EU’s focus. Here, we must take the lead,” said von der Leyen at the summit.