22. Stargate and the fight for AI supremacy – this is Europe’s wake-up call

Stargate and the fight for AI supremacy – this is Europe’s wake-up call By Andrea Renda and Pierre-Alexandre BallandThe announcement of the USD 500 billion US Stargate Project marks a bold leap into the future for AI. Announced with great fanfare at the White House by President Trump, flanked by the CEOs of OpenAI, SoftBank and Oracle, the initiative aims to build the most advanced AI infrastructure the world has ever seen.This matters because AI drives innovation, creates industries, and fuels economic power – and those who lead in AI will shape the global power balance. And the scale is staggering. An initial USD 100 billion investment, ramping up to half a trillion dollars over four years, to fund state-of-the-art data centres, cutting-edge hardware and sustainable energy systems.Although the funding is currently private and tech leaders have skirmished over the availability of the committed funds, being announced right at the start of Trump’s presidency signals strong political backing and an explicit alliance with the Big Techs. This could lead to smoother AI regulatory processes, tax incentives and alignment with additional public spending initiatives, such as a future iteration of the Inflation Reduction Act or the CHIPS Act.The picture becomes even clearer if we consider that Stargate was announced immediately after Trump had scrapped the Biden administration’s Executive Order on AI, erasing and rewinding US AI policy and paving the way for an era of laissez faire AI. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.