Nvidia chief calls AI ‘the greatest equalizer’ — but warns Europe risks
falling behind
[June 12, 2025] By
THOMAS ADAMSON and KELVIN CHAN
PARIS (AP) — Will artificial intelligence save humanity — or destroy it?
Lift up the world’s poorest — or tighten the grip of a tech elite?
Jensen Huang — the global chip tycoon widely predicted to become one of
the world’s first trillionaires — offered his answer on Wednesday:
neither dystopia nor domination. AI, he said, is a tool for liberation.
Wearing his signature biker jacket and mobbed by fans for selfies, the
Nvidia CEO cut the figure of a tech rockstar as he took the stage at
VivaTech in Paris.
“AI is the greatest equalizer of people the world has ever created,”
Huang said, kicking off one of Europe’s biggest technology industry
fairs.
Huang’s core argument: AI can level the playing field, not tilt it.
Critics argue Nvidia’s dominance risks concentrating power in the hands
of a few. But Huang insists the opposite — that by slashing computing
costs and expanding access, “we’re democratizing intelligence” for
startups and nations alike.
But beyond the sheeny optics, Nvidia used the Paris summit to unveil a
wave of infrastructure announcements across Europe, signaling a dramatic
expansion of the AI chipmaker’s physical and strategic footprint on the
continent.
In France, the company is deploying 18,000 of its new Blackwell chips
with startup Mistral AI. In Germany, it’s building an industrial AI
cloud to support manufacturers. Similar rollouts are underway in Italy,
Spain, Finland and the U.K., including a new AI lab in Britain.
Other announcements include a partnership with AI startup Perplexity to
bring sovereign AI models to European publishers and telecoms, a new
cloud platform with Mistral AI, and work with BMW and Mercedes-Benz to
train AI-powered robots for use in auto plants.
The announcements underscore how central AI infrastructure has become to
global strategy — and how Nvidia, now the world’s most valuable
chipmaker, is positioning itself as the engine behind it.
As the company rolls out ever more powerful systems, critics warn the
model risks creating a new kind of “technological priesthood” — one in
which only the wealthiest companies or governments can afford the
compute power, energy, and elite engineering talent required to
participate. That, they argue, could choke the bottom-up innovation that
built the tech industry in the first place.
Huang pushed back. “Through the velocity of our innovation, we
democratize,” he said, responding to a question by The Associated Press.
“We lower the cost of access to technology.”
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 As Huang put it, these factories
“reason,” “plan,” and “spend a lot of time talking to” themselves,
powering everything from ChatGPT to autonomous vehicles and
diagnostics.
But some critics warn that without guardrails, such all-seeing,
self-reinforcing systems could go the way of Skynet in “ The
Terminator ” movie — vast intelligence engines that outpace human
control.
To that, Huang offers a counter-model: layered AI governance by
design. “In the future,” he said, “the AI that is doing the task is
going to be surrounded by 70 or 80 other AIs that are supervising
it, observing it, guarding it, ensuring that it doesn’t go off the
rails.”
He likened the moment to a new industrial revolution. Just as
electricity transformed the last one, Huang said, AI will power the
next — and that means every country needs a national intelligence
infrastructure. That’s why, he explained, he’s been crisscrossing
the globe meeting heads of state.
“They all want AI to be part of their infrastructure,” he said.
“They want AI to be a growth manufacturing industry for them.”
Europe, long praised for its leadership on digital rights, now finds
itself at a crossroads. As Brussels pushes forward with world-first
AI regulations, some warn that over-caution could cost the bloc its
place in the global race. With the U.S. and China surging ahead and
most major AI firms based elsewhere, the risk isn’t just falling
behind — it’s becoming irrelevant.
Huang has a different vision: sovereign AI. Not isolation, but
autonomy — building national AI systems aligned with local values,
independent of foreign tech giants.
“The data belongs to you,” Huang said. “It belongs to your people,
your country... your culture, your history, your common sense.”
But fears over AI misuse remain potent — from surveillance and
deepfake propaganda to job losses and algorithmic discrimination.
Huang doesn’t deny the risks. But he insists the technology can be
kept in check — by itself.
The VivaTech event was part of Huang’s broader European tour. He had
already appeared at London Tech Week and is scheduled to visit
Germany. In Paris, he joined French President Emmanuel Macron and
Mistral AI CEO Arthur Mensch to reinforce his message that AI is now
a national priority.
___
Chan reported from London.
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