EU-Canada summit: Strengthen cooperation on AI

Summit in Montreal EU and Canada want to come together on AI As of: October 30, 2026 • 7:38 a.m

Becoming more independent together - that is the major goal of the new alliance between Canada and the EU. An example: collaboration in the area of ​​artificial intelligence.

Google Gemini, ChatGPT or Claude - so far, US companies have dominated the artificial intelligence (AI) market. Both the EU with its member states and Canada see this as a problem.

EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen points out the resulting dangers at the EU-Canada summit in Montreal. "Our industries are increasingly reliant on access to these technologies. And when that access depends on a few large companies, decisions made elsewhere can put our businesses and vital services at risk."

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Canada's Prime Minister Mark Carney is also determined. He no longer wants to wait for the future of artificial intelligence to be decided somewhere else - by unknown people who are not trusted.

Shortly before the start of the EU-Canada summit, the Prime Minister announced that his government would invest 1.6 billion Canadian dollars in the domestic AI company Cohere. "This will keep Cohere Canadian and create opportunities for our workers and businesses. Cohere creates good jobs and is expected to invest at least $1.7 billion in new IT infrastructure in Canada by the end of this decade."

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The Canadian company Cohere develops secure AI solutions that comply with EU law - and thus addresses a need for many customers, as AI boss Joelle Pineau explains: "Many governments and companies want to have control over their entire AI infrastructure," says Pineau. "They want to know where their data is stored and used or how their system behaves."

In order to develop such a secure AI, von der Leyen wants to work with the Canadians: "In this way, we can better exploit the benefits of AI, jointly expand our own competencies, invest in the AI ​​infrastructure, bring our researchers together in joint projects and help our start-ups to survive in global competition."

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Cohere recently merged with a German AI start-up. The Heidelberg company Aleph Alpha joined forces with the Canadian partner. That paid off. Because Cohere can now look forward to money from Germany - in addition to private investments from tech giants like Nvidia.

For example from the Schwarz group of companies, says Pineau. "This is a great opportunity. If we pool our resources, we have a better chance of developing groundbreaking technologies," emphasizes Coheres AI boss.

The situation for Cohere has already improved noticeably. After the many recent investments, the Canadian company claims to have become the largest AI company outside the USA.

This topic in the program: tagesschau.de | How Canada and the EU are strengthening their cooperation on AI | Oct 30, 2026 | 6:28 a.m