Commission to adopt AI in science strategy on October 7

The European Commission expects to adopt its AI in science strategy on October 7, it announced during its annual Research and Innovation Days conference in Brussels on September 17.

The strategy will pave the way for the creation of the Resource for AI Science in Europe (Raise), which will  support the use of AI in science and science for AI development. It will do so by pooling efforts on data, infrastructures, talent and funding, said Maria Cristina Russo, director for prosperity at the Commission’s research and innovation directorate general.

Raise will be based on the concept of a “CERN for AI,” in reference to the nuclear research centre in Geneva, which Ursula von der Leyen first promised to deliver in July 2024 while seeking a second term as Commission president.

But unlike CERN, Raise will be distributed throughout Europe, linking existing infrastructures, including the EU’s AI factories and planned AI gigafactories.

“Through the different interactions we had with the scientific community, we thought the best way forward is to have networking of what exists in Europe and strengthening of what exists, instead of creating new infrastructures,” Russo said.

The distributed model has the backing of the Commission’s independent scientific advisors, who recommended setting up a CERN for AI in a report published in April 2024. “All parts of Europe would be included and have transparent and easy access,” which would not be the case with a centralised institution, the group’s chair, Nicole Grobert, told Science|Business at the time.

The Commission plans to launch an official call for the establishment of AI gigafactories, which will specialise in the training of very large AI models, towards the end of the year.

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It has already selected 13 AI factories across Europe. These aim to build ecosystems around AI-optimised supercomputers, offering access to computing power, data and skills.

The different sites are already talking to each other, said Petra Dalunde, co-director of the Swedish AI factory, during the event in Brussels. “Now, our task is to make sure that the customers and researchers that are coming end up in the right AI factory [. . .] but also to have a good knowledge of the other large AI infrastructures in the EU,” she said.

The Commission plans to announce more details of the Raise initiative during an inaugural event in Copenhagen on November 3-4.

During a separate panel, research Commissioner Ekaterina Zaharieva confirmed that, in two weeks, the Commission will adopt its “apply AI strategy,” which will aim to support new industrial and public sector uses of AI.e