Germany plans to significantly boost AI computing power

According to a data center expansion strategy plan released by the German government on the 17th, by 2030, the computing power of general-purpose data centers in Germany will be at least doubled compared with 2025, and the computing power specifically allocated for artificial intelligence (AI) will increase to at least 4 times that of 2025. On the same day, Germany’s Minister for Digitalization and National Modernization, Carsten Werdelbeger, said to the media that this strategy is intended to meet the rapidly growing data processing demands driven by AI applications, cloud services, and ongoing digitalization processes. “From a global perspective, we clearly still have a lot of catching up to do,” Werdelbeger said.

The strategic document, which is expected to be submitted for approval by the German cabinet, proposes 28 specific measures in total, with the core goal of helping Germany become a leading data center hub in Europe that also has data sovereignty.

According to disclosures by German media, the above measures cover multiple key areas, including reforming the tax mechanisms for data centers—shifting the right to levy business tax from the location where the operating company is registered to the actual location of the data center; simplifying the planning and approval procedures for constructing new data centers, and helping investors find available land parcels; and pushing data centers to achieve 100% power supply from renewable energy as soon as possible, among other steps.

The strategic document also proposes that new data center capacity will be prioritized to be built by German and European companies, in order to reduce Germany’s reliance on large cloud service providers outside Europe, such as Amazon’s cloud computing services platforms under Amazon in the United States. (Xinhua News Agency)