A few days before the summit of the action of artificial intelligence in Paris, the French presidency announced the first of several expected financial initiatives linked to AI. Emmanuel Macron in France and Mohamed Bin Zayed, Al Nahyan of the United Emirates, signed an agreement for an important investment in order to build a massive data center dedicated to artificial intelligence in France.
According to a AFP reportFrance and the United Arab Emirates could spend “30 to 50 billion euros” (31 to 52 billion dollars at current exchange rates) to build an AI campus. Most of the investment would go to a data center with a capacity up to 1 GW.
Thursday morning, the digital minister and the AI of France, Clara Chappaz, said that France had identified 35 locations which could be used to build new data centers with accelerated administrative approvals. The investment of the water data center will likely benefit from this framework.
Approximately 65% France’s electricity production comes from nuclear power plants. The country also obtains around 25% of its electricity from renewable sources. While large technological companies find it difficult to reduce their carbon footprint, France uses the Summit of Action as an opportunity to attract foreign investments, especially for these data centers swallowed with power.
A consortium of French investors and Emiratis will support the data center project in France. MGX, the Emirati investment company dedicated to artificial intelligence, will contribute.
MGX was also listed as one of the first Stargate investors, the Large -scale AI investment project led by SoftBank and Openai. Commenting Stargate and the Chinese IA startup, the recent breakthrough of Deepseek, Chappaz had a hope of the future perspectives of France and Europe.
“Just the magnitude and the scale between these two announcements show that this is only the beginning,” she said during a technological meeting organized by Balderton and photoroom on Thursday evening. “Because this technology is our opportunity to catch up,” she added.
On Monday and Tuesday, the heads of state will flow to Paris to meet world technological leaders. They will probably announce more investment transactions and a joint declaration. The diplomatic agreement could potentially focus on the environmental impact of artificial intelligence.
US vice-president JD Vance, Chinese Deputy Prime Minister Zhang Guoqing, the president of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen, and the Chancellor of Germany Olaf Scholz should all come to the Grand Palais in Paris for the summit.
