La France s’allie aux Émirats et à NVIDIA pour bâtir le campus d’intelligence artificielle destiné à devenir le plus grand d’Europe

France, UAE, and NVIDIA Collaborate on Europe's Largest AI Campus

Bpifrance, MGX, Mistral AI, and NVIDIA have announced a joint venture to establish a 1.4 GW AI campus in the Île-de-France region. This project, backed by the French government, is a significant step towards establishing European technological sovereignty.

During the Choose France summit, a new AI Campus project was revealed, which is set to become the largest in Europe. Led by Bpifrance , MGX , Mistral AI , and NVIDIA , the initiative aims to provide France with a sovereign infrastructure that supports the entire AI technology lifecycle, including training, inference, development, and industrial deployment.

Scheduled to be operational by 2028, the campus will be located in Île-de-France with a capacity of 1.4 gigawatts , comparable to the largest global high-performance computing centers. It will feature real-world testing capabilities, collaborative research programs, and a low-carbon open cloud platform.

The project is supported by a coalition of four key players . Bpifrance acts as a catalyst for technological sovereignty, extending its commitments in cloud and semiconductors. Mistral AI, a young French leader in generative AI, ensures algorithmic performance and open source logic. NVIDIA, a global leader in GPUs and computing platforms, provides the industrial expertise for exascale infrastructure design.

MGX , a technology investment fund founded by Abu Dhabi in 2024, adds a new geopolitical dimension to the initiative. Presided over by Sheikh Tahnoun bin Zayed Al Nahyan , this marks MGX's first European investment . As a strategic operator, the Emirati fund offers infrastructure co-development expertise, connections to the MBZUAI academic ecosystem, and the ability to structure long-term alliances in critical technologies.

The AI Campus originates from bilateral agreements signed between France and the UAE in early 2025, aimed at fostering collaborations in AI, computing capacity, and applied research. The presence of Nicolas Dufourcq , CEO of Bpifrance, Khaldoon Al Mubarak , Chairman of the Executive Affairs Authority of Abu Dhabi, and the French Economy Minister at the signing ceremony highlights the political intent to position this campus as a shared power lever .

Designed as an open center, the campus seeks to address the needs of strategic sectors (healthcare, industry, energy, mobility, finance), while considering the energy and climate constraints of the post-cloud era. Technical partners (EDF, RTE, Bouygues, Sipartech) will ensure efficient and sustainable operation through low-carbon energy supply and high-capacity fiber connectivity.

A Pivot in European Industrial Strategy?

This project may represent a model for a sovereign European AI infrastructure . It is not merely a data center but a hub where research, training, high-performance computing, and industrial deployment converge towards strategic autonomy. The involvement of École Polytechnique, which will develop a research chair and PhD programs in collaboration with MBZUAI, reinforces this academic ambition.

In a context where the European Union is still defining its AI and cloud infrastructure strategies, the Franco-Emirati initiative led by MGX could pave a new path of cooperative sovereignty , with non-European partners driving key projects.

D’après FrenchWeb.