Airbus picks Iliad's Scaleway for AI, defence work in sovereignty push

By Leo Marchandon and Gianluca Lo Nostro

July 16 (Reuters) - Airbus said on Thursday it had signed a multi-year agreement with Iliad-owned Scaleway to provide cloud infrastructure for sensitive industrial and defence applications, supporting the deployment of AI tools developed with French startup Mistral.

The European planemaker said Scaleway would host critical applications spanning aircraft design, engineering, industrial production and corporate operations. Airbus signed a partnership with Mistral in May to co-develop customised AI tools for aerospace and defence.

"The fact that the Mistral models are already deployed on Scaleway infrastructure will allow us to accelerate our AI approach," Airbus Chief Digital Officer Catherine Jestin told reporters.

Airbus plans to use Mistral's technology for military applications and certified aviation systems, areas where the company wants European partners to handle intellectual property, research and development, and sensitive data.

DIGITAL SOVEREIGNTY

Jestin said Airbus selected Scaleway after assessing more than 150 technical and legal requirements.

"The second set of criteria concerned legal requirements, in particular the much-discussed protection against the kill switch and against the application of extraterritorial laws," she said.

European governments and companies have increasingly focused on digital sovereignty as AI becomes embedded in critical infrastructure, defence and industrial operations. The European Commission last month proposed a Cloud and AI Development Act aimed at expanding domestic cloud and computing capacity.

Airbus will migrate around 70 critical applications to Scaleway by the end of 2028, with the broader programme potentially covering up to 900 applications over the next five to six years.

Airbus did not disclose the value of the agreement.

(Reporting by Gianluca Lo Nostro and Leo Marchandon in Gdansk; editing by Matt Scuffham)