Europe's AI Gigafactory Push Attracts 76 Bids, EU Tech Chief Says

Executive Vice-president of the European Commission for Technological Sovereignty, Security and Democracy Henna Virkkunen attends a press point on the Communication on the EU Action Plan on Cable Security, Helsinki, Finland, February 21, 2025. Lehtikuva/Emmi Korhonen via REUTERS /File Photo
Executive Vice-president of the European Commission for Technological Sovereignty, Security and Democracy Henna Virkkunen attends a press point on the Communication on the EU Action Plan on Cable Security, Helsinki, Finland, February 21, 2025. Lehtikuva/Emmi Korhonen via REUTERS /File Photo
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Europe's AI Gigafactory Push Attracts 76 Bids, EU Tech Chief Says

Executive Vice-president of the European Commission for Technological Sovereignty, Security and Democracy Henna Virkkunen attends a press point on the Communication on the EU Action Plan on Cable Security, Helsinki, Finland, February 21, 2025. Lehtikuva/Emmi Korhonen via REUTERS /File Photo
Executive Vice-president of the European Commission for Technological Sovereignty, Security and Democracy Henna Virkkunen attends a press point on the Communication on the EU Action Plan on Cable Security, Helsinki, Finland, February 21, 2025. Lehtikuva/Emmi Korhonen via REUTERS /File Photo

Seventy-six companies have bid to develop Europe's artificial intelligence gigafactories, the EU's tech chief said on Monday, hailing a bigger than expected response to the bloc's push to catch up with the US and China in this key technology.

The European Commission made the announcement four months after it allocated 20 billion euros ($23 billion) in EU funding for the construction of four AI gigafactories across the bloc.

Such facilities, in essence large-scale AI computing and data storage hubs, will be equipped with about 100,000 state-of-the-art AI chips, Reuters reported.

"We got 76 submissions proposing to set up AI gigafactories in 16 member states and across 60 different sites," EU tech chief Henna Virkkunen told a press conference.

"And this exceeds far beyond our expectations and this showcases Europe's growing momentum and enthusiasm for innovating in AI in Europe," she said, declining to name the companies because of business confidentiality information.

The EU executive said applicants included EU and non-EU companies, among them tech giants, data centre operators, telecoms providers, power suppliers and financial investors.

"Together they have now indicated plans to acquire at least 3 million latest generation of AI processors (GPUs) in total," Virkkunen said. The Commission will launch an official call for setting up the AI gigafactories at the end of the year.



Microsoft Halts China-based Tech Support for Pentagon Systems

FILE - The Microsoft company logo is displayed at their offices in Sydney, Australia, on Feb. 3, 2021. (AP Photo/Rick Rycroft, File)
FILE - The Microsoft company logo is displayed at their offices in Sydney, Australia, on Feb. 3, 2021. (AP Photo/Rick Rycroft, File)
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Microsoft Halts China-based Tech Support for Pentagon Systems

FILE - The Microsoft company logo is displayed at their offices in Sydney, Australia, on Feb. 3, 2021. (AP Photo/Rick Rycroft, File)
FILE - The Microsoft company logo is displayed at their offices in Sydney, Australia, on Feb. 3, 2021. (AP Photo/Rick Rycroft, File)

Microsoft said Friday it is making sure that personnel based in China are not providing technical support for US Defense Department systems, after investigative news site ProPublica revealed the practice earlier this week.

Pentagon chief Pete Hegseth confirmed that work on Defense Department cloud services had been outsourced to people in China, insisting that the country will not have "any involvement whatsoever" with the department's systems going forward.

"Microsoft has made changes to our support for US Government customers to assure that no China-based engineering teams are providing technical assistance for DoD Government cloud and related services," the company's chief communications officer, Frank Shaw, said in a post on X.

ProPublica reported Tuesday that the tech giant was using engineers based in China -- Washington's primary military rival -- to maintain Pentagon computer systems, with only limited supervision by US personnel who often lacked the necessary expertise to do the job effectively.

US Senator Tom Cotton asked Hegseth to look into the matter in a letter dated Thursday, and the Pentagon chief responded that he would do so.

Hegseth then posted a video on X Friday evening in which he said "it turns out that some tech companies have been using cheap Chinese labor to assist with DoD cloud services. This is obviously unacceptable, especially in today's digital threat environment."

"At my direction, the department will... initiate -- as fast as we can -- a two-week review, or faster, to make sure that what we uncovered isn't happening anywhere else across the DoD," AFP quoted him as saying.

"We will continue to monitor and counter all threats to our military infrastructure and online networks," he added, thanking "all those Americans out there in the media and elsewhere who raised this issue to our attention so we could address it."