Spanta Mukherjee
STOCKHOLM (Reuters) – Microsoft will invest 33.7 billion Swedish kronor ($3.2 billion) over two years to expand its cloud and artificial intelligence infrastructure in Sweden, it said on Monday.
The growing popularity of generative AI has boosted demand for cloud services, prompting companies such as Microsoft and Amazon Web Services to invest billions of dollars in building data centers in Europe.
Microsoft invested in data centers in the UK in November, and in Germany and Spain in February.
“We'll probably have some more announcements in the fall,” Microsoft President Brad Smith said in an interview.
Microsoft plans to install 20,000 cutting-edge graphics processing units to speed up computer calculations in data centers in Sandviken, Gävle and Staffanstorp in Sweden.
Smith said the company will use faster processors from Nvidia and may switch to AMD semiconductors or eventually its own chips.
The race to develop generative AI programs has created a surge in demand for advanced chips that can support these complex applications.
Microsoft said it is committed to driving AI adoption across Sweden and the entire Nordic region, which includes Denmark, Finland, Iceland and Norway.
Over three years, the company plans to train 250,000 Swedes in AI skills across organizations, schools, universities, the public sector and society at large.
The company also invests in renewable energy and has procured around 1,000 MW of renewable energy in Sweden.
Goldman Sachs sees the AI boom as a nearly $1 trillion opportunity for the sector as tech companies invest in data centers to train large, power-hungry language models.
“AI is a technological change that should be seen as a multiplier effect and a catalyst. It will be part of our future strategy as we enter a new phase, an investment phase, after successfully fighting inflation,” Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Christersson said.
(1 dollar = 10.5137 Swedish kronor)
(Reporting by Spanta Mukherjee; Writing by Terje Solsvik; Editing by Steen Jacobsen and Louise Heavens)
