The race to attract artificial intelligence investment is becoming increasingly personal. Rather than leaving negotiations to ministers or agencies, French President Emmanuel Macron and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi have taken the lead in meeting technology executives as both countries compete to secure major AI projects and data center investments.
Macron has spent much of the year promoting France as a home for large-scale AI infrastructure. His direct talks with SoftBank founder Masayoshi Son helped pave the way for a multibillion-dollar commitment to build AI data centers in France over the next several years. During the G7 summit, he also invited leaders from OpenAI, Anthropic, Google DeepMind and other AI companies to discuss the industry’s future, reinforcing France’s push to become one of Europe’s leading AI hubs.
India is taking a similar approach, but with a different goal. The country still depends heavily on foreign technology for advanced chips and AI models, making outside investment a priority. Modi has met with executives from Amazon‚ Microsoft‚ Google and Intel‚ asking them to expand their presence in India‚ subsidizing AI infrastructure‚ and subsidizing semiconductor manufacturing‚ resulting in several such companies announcing large investments in India․
In a race to position themselves as the future leaders of the AI industry‚ personal diplomacy is creeping into the political process‚ with France planning to build more computing power and India focused on luring the technology and investment needed to catch up with its international competitors․
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