BERLIN: Europe must strive to lead in the AI race, top officials urged on Tuesday at a summit focused on propelling the region to the forefront of the digital era and reducing its reliance on US tech titans.

As the Berlin gathering got underway, the EU also announced that Amazon and Microsoft cloud services could face stricter competition rules in the bloc as Brussels probes their market power.

The summit brought together leaders from Europe’s tech sector, and was to be addressed by German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and French President Emmanuel Macron.

“Europe’s goal is very simple: we want to lead, not follow, on AI and frontier technologies,” European Commission digital chief Henna Virkkunen told the opening of the event. “We have the market, we have the talent, we have the ambition. Now we must deliver scale in investment, innovation and uptake.”

Europe is responding to calls to blaze its own digital path and take steps to catch up in the AI race against China and the United States. Concerns about US tech dominance have also grown as ties with Wash­ington become increasingly uneasy under the “America First” administration of Donald Trump.

Despite the US-Europe tensions, a senior official from the French presidency said the summit was not about “confrontation” with the United States or even China, but rather protecting “our core sovereignty”.

Published in Dawn, November 19th, 2025