Slovenia among the digital giants: a new supercomputer and AI factory to boost technological power
Slovenia joins the countries that will play a key role in the future of AI in Europe. Under the EU's latest initiative, Slovenia will host one of six new AI factories, backed by a high-performance supercomputer. This is a strategic step towards the development of a state-of-the-art computing infrastructure that will strengthen research, innovation and digital sovereignty of Slovenia and Europe.
New European initiatives for artificial intelligence: Expansion of the EuroHPC AI factories network across Europe. | Author European Comission
The European Joint Undertaking for High Performance Computing (EuroHPC) has selected six new proposals in addition to the previous seven proposals for setting up AI factories in the EU. Twenty-one Member States and two associated EuroHPC countries will participate in the initiative.
The infrastructure and services of AI factories are essential to fully exploit the potential of AI in Europe. Supported by a world-class network of EU supercomputers, AI factories will bring together the key ingredients for AI innovation: computing power, data and talent. The AI factories will be a cornerstone of the Commission's strategy to make Europe an AI continent and will enable companies and researchers across the EU, in particular small and medium-sized enterprises and start-ups, to enhance training and large-scale development of general-purpose, trustworthy and ethical AI models.
The newly selected AI factories will be set up in Austria, Bulgaria, France, Germany, Poland and Slovenia, representing a total national and EU investment of around EUR 350 million.
All the AI factories will be joined up and interconnected to serve national AI strategies and the pan-European AI ecosystem. The AI Factories will provide privileged access for AI start-ups and in some cases will also host small and medium-sized enterprises. The first seven AI Factories, selected in December 2024, are expected to be operational in April 2025.
The deadline for the submission of proposals for the third round of AI factories is 2 May 2025. Furthermore, the EuroHPC Joint Undertaking will launch a call for the selection of AI factory antennas in April 2025, which will allow several participating EuroHPC countries to deploy national AI factory services without having to invest in their own supercomputing infrastructure.
In addition, by the end of 2025, the EU plans to have several AI Gigafactories - huge high-performance computing facilities dedicated to developing and training next-generation AI models and applications - in place across Europe. As announced by President Von der Leyen in Paris, both AI Factories and AI Gigafactories will be part of the Invest AI initiative, which is part of the AI Continent Action Plan and is expected to mobilise up to EUR 200 billion for European investment in AI.
More information on the newly selected AI factory proposals: https://eurohpc-ju.europa.eu/eurohpc-ju-selects-additional-ai-factories-strengthen-europes-ai-leadership-2025-03-11_en