🤖 EU AI & Sovereignty Weekly

Wednesday, 5 August 2026

Commission finalises Scaleup Europe Fund — €5 billion for European scaleups

The Commission has taken the final legal steps to launch the Scaleup Europe Fund, aimed at helping European scaleups grow faster and compete globally, with an initial target size of €5 billion. It is a concrete financing pillar of European tech sovereignty — backing European AI and deep tech champions to reduce dependence on foreign investors.

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Third EU-India Trade & Technology Council — cooperation on AI, semiconductors and quantum

The EU and India held their third Trade & Technology Council meeting in Brussels, agreeing to step up cooperation on semiconductors, high-performance computing, quantum technologies, artificial intelligence and 6G. They will also negotiate India’s association to Horizon Europe and set up an EU-India Startup Partnership for deep tech — a strategic move to strengthen critical value chains.

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Commission approves €659 million German state aid for four semiconductor plants

The Commission approved €659 million in German state aid for four ‘first-of-a-kind’ facilities in the semiconductor value chain. The measure strengthens the EU’s position and autonomy in semiconductors and fits the objectives of the European Chips Act and the 2024-2029 political guidelines. It is one of the concrete building blocks for Europe’s capacity to develop its own AI hardware and infrastructure.

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AI Act enforcement and transparency rules in force since 2 August

Since 2 August, the Commission’s AI Office and national authorities enforce the AI Act, and the new transparency rules apply: chatbots must disclose they are AI, deepfakes must be labelled and AI-generated content must carry machine-readable markings. The first complaints and whistleblower tools are operational, and the first concrete enforcement actions are expected in the coming weeks. This is the defining story of the European AI legal framework this autumn.

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EU launches AI Gigafactories call — up to €30 billion investment

The EU has launched a call for up to seven AI Gigafactories, backed by up to €10 billion in EU and national funds and targeting at least €20 billion in private investment. Together with the network of 19 AI Factories, this must expand Europe’s compute capacity for training and inference of frontier AI models and deliver strategic autonomy. It is the most important sovereignty file for Europe’s computing power to watch in the coming weeks.

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Commission requires Google AI interoperability on Android and search data sharing (DMA)

The Commission imposed two sets of binding specification measures on Google under the Digital Markets Act. One ensures rival AI assistants, such as alternatives to Gemini, get equal access to features on Android devices; the other obliges Google to give third-party search engines access to search data that only Google Search collects at scale. The goal is fair competition in the AI assistant and search markets and more choice for EU users.

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Commission fines AliExpress €550 million for DSA breaches

The Commission fined AliExpress €550 million for breaching the Digital Services Act, as the platform inadequately assessed and limited risks around the spread of illegal, unsafe or counterfeit products. AliExpress is ordered to take corrective measures; if non-compliance persists, periodic penalty payments may follow. VP Virkkunen stressed that scale is no excuse and risks must be tackled systematically to keep consumers safe when shopping online.

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Over 190 organisations sign Code of Practice on AI-generated content transparency

Around 190 organisations, including Google, Meta, Microsoft, OpenAI, Anthropic, Mistral and Aleph Alpha, signed the Code of Practice on Transparency of AI-generated Content, just before the AI Act marking requirements took effect on 2 August. The code offers providers and deployers a streamlined, legally certain route to meet the transparency obligations. Two taskforces will be launched in September 2026 to shape implementation.

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AI Omnibus enters into force — simplification with longer deadlines

On 27 July, the AI Omnibus took effect EU-wide, with extended deadlines and administrative simplification in the AI legal framework while keeping strong safety and fundamental rights safeguards. High-risk AI from Annex III applies from 2 December 2027, and high-risk AI embedded in physical products from Annex I from 2 August 2028. A ban on ‘nudification’ apps is introduced and the AI Office gains broader enforcement powers.

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Fourth GPAI Taskforce meeting on safety, security and copyright

The fourth Signatory Taskforce meeting under the GPAI Code of Practice focused on the Safety and Security chapter and the Copyright chapter. The AI Office explained how model usage can be part of post-market monitoring and systemic risk assessment, and discussed ‘marginal-risk’ clauses in safety frameworks. On copyright, the meeting covered the obligation for GPAI model providers to publicly inform rightsholders about the webcrawlers and robots.txt settings they use.

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📈 Key Trends

• • The AI Act is now being enforced for real — expect concrete actions from the AI Office and national authorities in the coming weeks as complaints and whistleblower tools go live.
• • The AI Gigafactories call (up to seven factories) is the key sovereignty file for Europe’s computing power, aiming to unlock at least €30 billion.
• • Financing and semiconductors dominate: the €5 billion Scaleup Europe Fund and €659 million German state aid both support strategic autonomy.
• • Digital enforcement is stepping up — DMA interoperability for Google and a €550 million DSA fine for AliExpress.
• • In September, two taskforces of the Code of Practice on AI transparency will launch, and the Scaleup Europe Fund is expected to start investing shortly after the summer.

Daily generated by Hermes AI Agent · Sources linked above · ai-podium.com