Welcome to ICYMI – a weekly snapshot of European news stories that have given me pause for thought. ICYMI is a chance for you to go beyond the front-page headlines and find out what other stories may be worthy of your attention. This week:
- It is European tech conference season and Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang has been on tour making big promises in London and Paris
- AI is making it easier to create a startup
- Is AI’s insatiable demand for power causing issues for European governments?
June has become a key month for the European tech conference circuit with an array of high-profile events from SXSW in London through to The Next Web in Amsterdam.
In the last week London hosted its Tech Week while Paris followed with its premier event VivaTech 2025 a few days later.
At both the London and the Paris events the big draw was Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang. In London he shared a stage with UK PM Keir Starmer to unveil plans to invest millions of pounds of funding to train students in AI. Huang added that the country was right for investment as it boasted, Huang said, “one of the richest AI communities anywhere on the planet”, adding that it has the “best universities … amazing start-ups … and incredible thinkers in computer science.”
London’s thunder was partially stolen by Paris at VivaTech 2025, a few days later when Huang announced a multi-billion-euro partnership with French AI unicorn Mistral to build Europe’s largest AI campus, backed by MGX and Bpifrance. The initiative includes a cloud infrastructure equipped with 18,000 innovative Grace Blackwell chips.
Huang has become a key figure for European politicians and entrepreneurs, following ongoing pressure from governments in many of the continent’s countries to build AI development infrastructures that are not overly reliant on either Silicon Valley or the far east. As CNBC reports , Huang spoke a lot during the week about “sovereign AI” — the concept of building data centres within a country’s borders rather than relying on servers located overseas. Among European policymakers and companies, this has been an important topic.
AI is overwhelming data centres, creating soaring energy usage
Does that rush to build data centres though mean European countries will have to balance innovation with environmental concerns? A detailed analysis by Le Monde in France reveals the soaring energy demands of generative AI, from model training to everyday use, with tools like ChatGPT consuming gigawatt-hours for simple prompts. As use explodes—ChatGPT hit 800 million weekly users in April 2025—data centres struggle to keep up, often relying on fossil fuels and creating local tensions over electricity and water. Despite calls for transparency, major tech firms remain opaque.
Power management may soon be a critical issue for The Netherlands. Dutch grid operator TenneT says that key upgrades to the high-voltage grid in several areas are running four to six years late. Completion has slipped from 2029 to 2033 and could even reach 2035. The delay is caused by slow permit procedures, difficult land purchases and a general lack of space. The delays have a significant impact on the economy and the issue of housing shortages, and it could potentially make the Netherlands a less attractive place to settle for companies with high electricity demands.
In France L’ADN has a story about how AI is making it easier for founders to redefine startup business models. It is enabling entrepreneurs to build companies with minimal staff and zero external funding. Start-ups like Chatbase and Submagic exemplify this trend, using AI to automate core functions, avoid traditional venture capital routes, and remain 100% founder-owned while serving tens of thousands of users globally.
Finally, here is a story that is set to run and run. In the UK, WhatsApp has thrown its support behind Apple in a high-stakes legal battle with the UK Home Office over encrypted data access. The BBC reports that the UK government is seeking a “Technical Capability Notice” in order to access user data stored with Apple’s Advanced Data Protection (ADP). This is prompting Apple to pull ADP from the UK and launch legal action. WhatsApp, citing global privacy risks, says it would resist any law threatening end-to-end encryption, warning the case could set a global precedent for undermining secure communications.
