EU officials and the artificial intelligence community are concerned that new US export restrictions that apply to most EU countries could derail plans to use European supercomputers to train AI models. .
Commissioners Henna Virkunen and Maroš Šefčović expressed concern after the Biden administration announced restrictions on Monday that would apply to 17 EU member states.
“We believe that it is also in the economic and security interests of the United States for the EU to purchase unlimited cutting-edge AI chips from the United States,” they said in a joint statement.
The EU should be seen as “an economic opportunity for the United States, not a security risk,” they said. “We are confident that we can find ways to leverage AI technology and supercomputers to maintain secure supply chains across the Atlantic.”
The U.S. government said the decision was made to ensure that U.S. technology “supports the global use of AI and makes it difficult for adversaries to exploit advanced AI.”
The report lists 18 “key allies and partners” to whom the restrictions do not apply, including the 10 EU countries: the UK, Norway, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain and Sweden. has been done.
all other countries will face limitations It depends on the number of advanced graphics processing units (GPUs) that can be imported from the US. These chips are essential for large-scale supercomputers that will enable the development and training of AI models, as planned by the EU. AI factory.
EU supercomputer
The U.S. restrictions “could potentially impact the current and future deployment of supercomputing capacity in some EU member states and their companies,” European Commission spokesman Thomas Renier told Science. |Told Business.
“In the coming weeks, we will further consult and listen to EU member states and industry to gather information and assess the impact of this measure. Based on this feedback, we will “We will share our concerns and comments with the U.S. government,” he added.
The European High Performance Computing Joint Venture has so far commissioned nine EU supercomputers, five of which are in countries that the United States does not consider to be major allies or partners: Luxembourg, the Czech Republic, Bulgaria, Slovenia, and Portugal. It’s in Three more supercomputers, planned in Greece, Poland and Hungary, are also outside the range of preferred countries.
Meanwhile, Greece and Luxembourg will be home to two of the EU’s first AI factories announced in December, providing access to AI-optimized supercomputing resources.
The problem is that European supercomputers are completely dependent on GPUs from a few American companies, mostly Nvidia, and to a lesser extent AMD and Intel.
“Any restrictions could have a significant impact on open trade in critical technologies and disrupt global supply chains and innovation ecosystems,” said Cecilia Bornfeld Dahl, Executive Director of DigitalEurope. he said.
The industry group called for the creation of an EU-U.S. Critical Technologies and Dual-Use Council to ensure the EU remains a “reliable economic ally” and “is not treated like a security risk.” I’m looking for.
This could replace the existing EU-US Trade and Technical Council, but it has had limited success and risks being ignored under incoming US President Donald Trump. “This approach would have fewer working groups focused on AI, cyber harmonization, dual-use technologies, and critical infrastructure, and more focus on critical technology and defense,” Bornfeldal said.
surprising decision
The decision to apply restrictions to some EU countries and not others came as a surprise to the AI community.
“This divisive approach by the United States undermines the very ideals on which the European Union is founded,” said Holger Huss, founder of the European Union of Artificial Intelligence Research Institutes. “I can’t imagine why Germany would be exempt and Luxembourg not.”
He hopes that the participation of Luxembourg, where the European Commission’s technical directorate, DG Connect, is located, could serve as a wake-up call for the EU to be more proactive in its pursuit of technological sovereignty.
On the other hand, exempt countries should not become complacent, as the restrictions could be extended in the future by the incoming Trump administration, which wants to prioritize U.S. interests over relations with Europe. “We should be worried,” Huss said of his native Germany.
He suggested that even supercomputers that already have a secured supply of GPUs could be affected. “Even if we build an AI factory now, it will become obsolete within three years and will need to be updated.”
Export restrictions could have ripple effects in many sectors, including the aviation and auto industries, which are increasingly reliant on AI technology and Nvidia chips. “If we lost access to our cutting-edge chips, our competitiveness would be significantly reduced,” Foos said.
He suggested there was one step Europe could take. U.S. chipmakers rely on lithography equipment made by a single Dutch company, ASML. However, restricting access to this European technology is extremely dangerous. “If you attempt to use this lever, there is a good chance you will seriously damage or even destroy one of our European champions.”
Start with software
Before European supercomputers can operate without American components, AI developers will need to have software alternatives, such as Nvidia’s CUDA, that tie into specific chips.
“As long as researchers use CUDA, researchers will use Nvidia,” says SiPearl, a company founded under the European Processor Initiative to design a European supercomputing processor. said Philippe Notton, Founder and CEO.
He said European AI research funding should prioritize the development of applications that use alternative software.
On the other hand, developing a European GPU would require a significant increase in investment. “US funding is huge to develop NVIDIA competitors.”
Notton believes the US export restrictions are “very good news” for European industry, and that this means policymakers need to invest now to avoid increasing dependence on American technology. We hope that this will serve as a wake-up call.
Meanwhile, U.S. semiconductor manufacturers are concerned that the restrictions will have a negative impact on their business. in statement Nvidia made the announcement on its website, slamming the Biden administration’s “misguided” attempts to regulate the sector.
“Restrictions may be justified, but there is always the risk of forcing restricted countries to develop their own technology,” said Steve Conway, senior analyst at Intersect360 Research in the US. He said there was a risk of losing the market and creating new competitors.
