NVIDIA is actively expanding in Europe while questions grow about who can access American AI technology. The company’s shares rose 1.1% in early trading Thursday after it used the VivaTech conference in Paris to showcase its growing AI chip business across Europe. Here’s a look at the European opportunity and why now is an important moment.
NVIDIA has invested in the French AI startup Mistral, which recently raised $830 million in debt to help build 200 megawatts of AI computing capacity across Europe by 2027. Nvidia and Mistral are also working together in a group to build a 1.4 gigawatt data center campus near Paris. This new facility would compete with the biggest AI infrastructure sites in the United States.
Mistral’s investment is much smaller than what the largest American tech companies spend. For example, Alphabet recently announced plans to raise $80 billion in equity for its own AI projects. Even so, Mistral’s efforts show that Europe’s goals for AI infrastructure are serious and growing, and NVIDIA aims to be the leading hardware partner for this expansion.
Politics are making European AI investment more urgent. French President Emmanuel Macron said at the G-7 conference this week that European governments cannot depend on American AI companies if access to their models can be cut off suddenly. He spoke after the Trump administration banned foreign use of two Anthropic AI models last week. Since NVIDIA sells chips instead of AI models, it is in a good position to benefit as European governments and companies look for infrastructure they can control without relying on American software providers.
NVIDIA’s stock has risen 9.8% so far this year and 41% over the past twelve months.
