US AI curbs push European firms to diversify providers

US Curbs on AI Push European Firms to Diversify Providers

Restrictions on access to certain American artificial intelligence services are prompting major European companies to accelerate their efforts to spread risk across multiple AI providers, reinforcing the push for domestic alternatives on the continent.

The trend was thrown into sharp relief this month when the U.S. government ordered Anthropic to suspend access to its most advanced AI models — Claude Fable 5 and Mythos 5 — for foreign nationals, citing national security concerns. The directive, received on June 12, led to a global shutdown of the models because a precise distinction based on nationality was technically unfeasible. The European Commission said it was assessing the “practical consequences” of the decision and that measures should not be discriminatory against partners.usnews

European Companies Spread Their Bets

Executives from Siemens, Renault, Orange, and French AI firm ChapsVision told Reuters at last week’s VivaTech conference in Paris that they already use a mix of U.S., Chinese, and European models to avoid dependence on any single provider. Siemens said it uses Chinese models DeepSeek and Alibaba’s Qwen, as well as Nvidia’s Nemotron alongside other U.S. and European models.globalbankingandfinance

“Sovereignty often gets confused with autarky, and autarky is absolutely not the way to do it,” Cedrik Neike, chief executive of Digital Industries at Siemens, told Reuters. “You need flexibility.”globalbankingandfinance

Orange said the Anthropic restrictions made “patently clear, if it wasn’t before, how important it is for Europe to have access to an AI service that it can control, that will never be switched off on a whim.” ChapsVision, which has won government contracts in France and Germany to replace U.S. rival Palantir, said sovereignty means having a credible alternative ready if a key service is cut.globalbankingandfinance

Sovereignty Push and Cost Pressures

The corporate shift aligns with the European Commission’s broader push for technological independence. On June 3, Brussels unveiled its Tech Sovereignty Package, including the Cloud and AI Development Act and Chips Act 2.0, aiming to reduce reliance on U.S. tech giants in cloud, AI, and semiconductors. Executive Vice-President Henna Virkkunen said the Commission wants to ensure no cloud provider handling critical operations possesses a “kill switch”.cnbc

Yet the challenge remains: Europe’s general-purpose AI providers are few, headed by France’s Mistral. OVHcloud Chief Executive Octave Klaba noted that in open-source AI, “when you look at European models, they’re not impressive.”globalbankingandfinance

Rising costs add urgency. Token fees are climbing as companies adopt agentic AI systems, with Orange citing Uber as a company that burned through its 2026 token budget in just four months. IT group Capgemini said most AI providers were adapting their offerings beyond remote access to ease dependency concerns in Europe — though it flagged the effort as a work in progress.globalbankingandfinance