Major investment in France’s AI infrastructure

Sunday 09 February 2025 - 17:00

Canadian investment firm Brookfield has announced plans to invest €20 billion ($21 billion) by 2030 to develop data centres critical for artificial intelligence (AI) advancements in France, according to a source close to the deal. This investment comes ahead of a global summit in Paris where political and tech leaders will discuss AI technologies.

As global competition intensifies in the AI race, particularly with the dominance of the United States and China, nations are striving to build the infrastructure necessary to support the vast data needs for training AI models. Brookfield will allocate €15 billion to construct new data centres, including a flagship project in Cambrai, northern France. The remaining €5 billion will fund essential infrastructure, particularly the energy systems required to power these data centres, which consume significant electricity.

Earlier, the French presidency announced a €30-50 billion investment by the United Arab Emirates to build a large data centre campus in France, which would become the largest in Europe upon completion. France already hosts over 300 data centres, ranking it as the sixth-largest global host, following the US, Germany, the UK, China, and Canada.

This announcement follows other major investment efforts, including a proposed $500 billion AI infrastructure plan backed by OpenAI and SoftBank.