By Ayomide Otitoju
Microsoft has announced plans to invest $10 billion from early next year in a large-scale data centre project in Portugal, aimed at expanding its artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure in Europe.
The initiative, undertaken in partnership with British firm Nscale — a specialist in AI data centres — and Portuguese developer Start Campus, will see the installation of 12,600 of Nvidia’s latest-generation chips. Start Campus has already begun construction of the facility near the southern port city of Sines.
Microsoft described the venture as “one of the largest investments in AI computing capacity in Europe.”
Speaking with Jornal de Negócios, Microsoft President Brad Smith said Portugal has become a key European hub for data centre development and technology investment. Smith is currently attending the Web Summit in Lisbon, an annual global technology conference often referred to as the “Davos for geeks.”
The Sines site, powered by renewable energy, also benefits from its strategic position as a connection point for major submarine telecommunications cables linking Europe to the Americas.
“The demand for AI-related data centres, particularly over the past five months, has become quite extraordinary,” said Daniel Bathurst, product director at Nscale, in an interview with AFP.
“For Microsoft, it’s a race against time,” Bathurst added. “We have the expertise, we have access to energy, and we can deliver this on schedule.”
