EU fights for ‘purpose’ in grand plan for technology, AI rules

BRUSSELS: China might have data and the US might have money, but Europe has purpose. That’s the message European Union tech czar Margrethe Vestager aims to convey on Wednesday when she unveils plans to help the bloc compete with the US and China’s technological might on its own terms, conforming with fundamental EU rights including strict privacy and non-discrimination rules.

On the EU’s menu: new rules for AI, possible legislation for gatekeeping platforms, plans to make data centers carbon-neutral, as well as incentives for businesses to share information with the aim of forming data pools that bolster innovation.

Vestager, the European Commission’s executive vice president for digital affairs, is trying to reassure anxious Europeans that she can handle concerns Europe is becoming irrelevant while Asian and American companies dominate high-tech markets.


The strategy “will produce and deploy much more artificial intelligence” in Europe, but “it will not be the same” as in the US and China, Vestager said in a press briefing to journalists ahead of the announcement. Based on what she knows about their practices, Chinese AI might not meet European standards, she said.