Europe needs a strategy to close the artificial intelligence compute gap

The race for AI dominance is significantly influenced by control over the computing infrastructure, with the US and China leading in this domain.
The US dominates the frontier chip design with firms like NVIDIA, while China seeks to reduce its dependence on the US chip ecosystem due to strategic and economic concerns.
China employs a combination of diplomatic efforts and domestic industrial growth to limit its reliance on US-based compute infrastructure, with Huawei at the forefront of its domestic efforts.
Europe, despite having substantial hardware assets like ASML and IMEC, risks long-term economic dependency on either US or Chinese compute infrastructure, affecting its AI development strategies and the autonomy of its AI applications.
While Europe could adopt China’s two-track strategy, it lacks a coordinated effort and the ability to create a captive market for European AI hardware similar to Huawei’s model.
For Europe to build a competitive AI hardware stack similar to Airbus’s success, a technology-driven approach focusing on genuine European comparative advantages and cooperative institutional frameworks are essential.
Transitioning to European-manufactured hardware may involve temporary performance and efficiency penalties, which could necessitate support mechanisms or incentives to sustain European firms in the short term.

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