French billionaire Xavier Niel pledges to invest up to $210 million in AI

Xavier Niel, the founder and CEO of Iliad, plans to invest up to $210 million in artificial intelligence (AI) projects. Iliad has opened a research center in Paris with an initial investment of $105 million, and Scaleway, an Iliad subsidiary, has acquired 1,016 Nvidia H100 GPUs to enhance its AI cloud solutions. Scaleway is also launching a European AI conference at Station F, a startup campus owned by Niel.

Niel aims to position himself at the forefront of the AI revolution in Europe, mirroring the increased AI investments in the U.S. and China. He is also an investor in French AI companies Poolside and Mistral AI, which are in the process of raising significant funding and will require GPU resources and AI researchers.

Key takeaways

Xavier Niel, CEO of Iliad, plans to invest up to $210 million in artificial intelligence projects.
Iliad has opened a research center in Paris with an initial investment of $105 million, which will hire AI researchers and provide grants to PhD students.
Scaleway, a subsidiary of Iliad, has acquired 1,016 Nvidia H100 GPUs and plans to collaborate with Nvidia to surface all of Nvidia’s AI tools and frameworks.
Scaleway is also launching a European AI conference at Station F in Paris, expected to attract over 1,000 attendees.

French billionaire Xavier Niel pledges to invest up to $210 million in AI | TechCrunch

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