Nvidia CEO Huang says countries must build sovereign AI infrastructure

AMSTERDAM (Reuters): Nvidia Jensen Huang said on Monday that every country needs to have its own artificial intelligence infrastructure in order to take advantage of the economic potential while protecting its own culture.

“You cannot allow that to be done by other people,” Huang said at the World Government Summit in Dubai.

Huang, whose firm has catapulted to a $1.73 trillion stock market value due to its dominance of the market for high-end AI chips, said his company is ‘democratizing’ access to AI due to swift efficiency gains in AI computing.

“The rest of it is really up to you to take initiative, activate your industry, build the infrastructure, as fast as you can.”

He said that fears about the dangers of AI are overblown, noting that other new technologies and industries such as cars and aviation have been successfully regulated.

“There are some interests to scare people about this new technology, to mystify this technology, to encourage other people to not do anything about that technology and rely on them to do it. And I think that’s a mistake.”

Following a new round of U.S. restrictions in October imposed on some of its AI chips, Nvidia said in November it was working with customers in China and the Middle East to obtain export licenses for new products that would comply with U.S. rules.

The CEO did not address that issue on Monday. Nvidia is due to report fourth-quarter earnings on Feb. 21.