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Vestager Warns Europe Cannot Match US AI Funding Wave, Urges Path Between Washington and Beijing

September 14, 2026 at 06:47 EDT

Policy & Regulation
Funding & M&A
Infra & Chips

Former EU competition chief Margrethe Vestager said Europe cannot replicate a U.S.-style “avalanche of funding” for artificial intelligence and must find a middle ground between American private-capital scale and Chinese state-directed finance if the bloc is to stay in the race for frontier systems.

14 September 2026 · European Union

A middle path on AI money

Former EU competition chief Margrethe Vestager says Europe cannot match a U.S. avalanche of AI funding and must chart a course between American private capital and Chinese state-directed finance.

Global AI compute share

Europe is a 1-block column beside a U.S. tower

~5%

EU today

~15%

China / EU 2030 target

~75%

United States

Each block is 5 percentage points. Europe’s 2030 aim matches China’s current share — still one-fifth of the U.S. column.

€100B

Public data-centre spend cited to lift Europe toward 15%

3×

Compute-share increase from ~5% today to 15% by 2030

<2%

European model-developer revenue vs two U.S. labs

10×

Aghion’s call for the Union to step up AI efforts

Immediate objectives

1 Supply-chain alliance

Turn ASML-class chokepoints into leverage

→

2 Compute on EU soil

Make data centres easier to build, with local benefit

→

3 Ready institutions

Put frontier AI expertise inside EU bodies

→

4 Assurance tech

Prove security of hosted models and hardware

What supporters stress

Recommendations are described as concrete and ready now. Europe still holds supply-chain assets, a large market, and technical talent — if it uses them this year.

What critics flag

Gigafactory delays and a risk that new capacity is sold to U.S. hyperscalers. The plan leans on foreign frontier models and arrives without costing or a legislative vehicle.

Vestager

“We cannot allow Europe to become a playground for foreign powers.”

If value is created outside EU borders, she argues, citizens will face the social shock of AI with fewer means to answer it — and governments are still treating other files as higher priority.

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