AI: Microsoft plans to invest billions in Sweden

The US tech group Microsoft will invest 33.7 billion Swedish kronor (around three billion euros) to expand its cloud and artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure in Sweden over a period of two years. This was announced by the company on Monday.

According to Microsoft's announcement, the company plans to deploy 20,000 of the most advanced graphics processors needed for AI training in its existing Swedish data centers in Sandviken, Gävle and Staffanstorp. The company will use processors from Nvidia and possibly semiconductors from AMD and some of its own chips, reports the news agency Reuters, citing Microsoft President Brad Smith. The initiative is intended to help strengthen Sweden's competitiveness in the field of AI, it is said.

Hundreds of thousands of AI training courses

Within this framework, Microsoft plans to train 250,000 people in companies, organizations, schools, universities and the public sector in AI skills over the next three years. This corresponds to around 2.4 percent of the entire Swedish population.

The program will focus on technical and vocational training for students, retraining for industry-specific professions and expert training for developers. "Microsoft is committed to increasing the availability and accelerating the adoption of AI across the Nordic region, including Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden," said Smith.

"AI is a technological change that should be seen as a multiplier or catalyst," Sweden's Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson is quoted as saying in the Microsoft announcement. "AI will not only have an impact on how we run companies, but will also help to accelerate developments in a number of other areas of technology." Microsoft's announcement is an example of "how we want to attract investment to Sweden to strengthen Swedish growth and competitiveness. It is part of the strategy we are pursuing as we enter a new phase after the successful fight against inflation, an investment phase," he said.

Billion-dollar AI business

The major US tech companies Google, Apple, Amazon, Microsoft and Meta are investing large sums in AI projects worldwide. Microsoft has invested billions of US dollars in OpenAI and uses the ChatGPT manufacturer's technology in its productivity software. At the end of February, the company also announced a new multi-year partnership with the AI startup Mistral, which aims to accelerate AI innovations.

Most recently, the tech portal The Information reported that Microsoft is working on a new, in-house AI language model that is powerful enough to compete with those of Google and OpenAI. At the beginning of May, US President Joseph Biden announced the construction of a USD 3.3 billion AI data center by Microsoft in the US state of Wisconsin, which is expected to create thousands of jobs there.

(akn)