Abu Dhabi-based MGX, Bpifrance and Mistral have announced plans to expand Campus AI across France, setting a target of up to 3 gigawatts of nationwide computing capacity as the country seeks to strengthen its position in Europe’s artificial intelligence infrastructure race.
The expansion builds on the flagship Campus AI project in Fouju, Seine-et-Marne, and includes the expected selection of a second site. The additional site would double the initial investment by the consortium and its partners, shifting the project from a single major campus into a broader national network of AI factories.
The French presidency’s Choose France 2026 press dossier put the investment tied to the second site at approximately $8.7 billion (€7.5 billion). It also said the project could create up to 500 direct jobs during construction and 700 permanent direct jobs once operational.
The announcement took place in the presence of French President Emmanuel Macron and Khaldoon Al Mubarak, chairman of Abu Dhabi’s Executive Affairs Authority and secretary-general of the Artificial Intelligence and Advanced Technology Council. Their presence underscored the political and industrial weight behind the project, which links France’s AI infrastructure ambitions with the United Arab Emirates’ growing role in global technology investment.
Campus AI Moves Beyond a Single Site
Campus AI was first announced in 2025 as a joint venture involving MGX, Bpifrance, Mistral AI and NVIDIA. The original project was designed to establish a large-scale AI campus in the Paris region, with MGX saying at the time that the site was expected to ultimately reach 1.4 GW of capacity.
The new plan raises the scale of the project significantly. Rather than relying only on the Fouju campus, the partners now want to develop a network of AI factories across France, with Mistral receiving priority access to compute capacity. That access is strategically important for the French AI company, whose ability to train, deploy and serve models depends on securing large volumes of high-performance computing power.
MGX said Campus AI is intended to support France’s industrial value chain, research and development base, and start-up ecosystem. The consortium has also emphasized links with French companies across power, batteries, semiconductors, electronics and other critical technologies.
The expansion reflects a broader shift in AI competition. Model development still attracts much of the public attention, but infrastructure has become one of the defining constraints in the sector. Access to chips, power, cooling systems, data center land and grid connections increasingly determines where AI companies can scale.
France Leans on Low-Carbon AI Infrastructure
The project is being presented as part of France’s push to become a leading European hub for decarbonized AI infrastructure. MGX said the Campus AI model would be powered by France’s highly decarbonized electricity grid and use water-free cooling and energy-efficient design.
That environmental framing is central to the project’s positioning. AI data centers require large amounts of electricity, making access to reliable and relatively low-carbon power a major factor in where large-scale AI infrastructure is built. France’s energy mix gives the country a potential advantage as governments and companies weigh the economic benefits of AI investment against pressure on grids, water systems and local communities.
The Élysée dossier described the Campus AI expansion as being designed to strict environmental standards and built in close collaboration with French leaders in semiconductors, batteries and critical technologies. Bpifrance also framed the project as part of a wider effort to build a European network of AI factories.
Europe’s AI Compute Gap Comes into Focus
Europe has produced major AI research talent and several emerging model developers, but the region continues to face a compute gap compared with the largest AI markets. The Campus AI expansion is one attempt to narrow that gap by giving European players access to infrastructure at a scale more commonly associated with global hyperscalers.
Mistral’s role is central to that strategy. As a French AI company with European ambitions, it gives the project a domestic anchor beyond the physical data center footprint. The partners are positioning Campus AI not simply as a data center buildout, but as infrastructure that can support model training, inference, industrial adoption and sovereign cloud requirements.
MGX’s role adds another layer. The Abu Dhabi investor has made AI infrastructure one of its core investment themes, alongside semiconductors and AI technology. Its participation in France shows how Gulf capital is increasingly moving into strategic technology infrastructure overseas, particularly in projects that combine political support, energy planning and long-term industrial demand.
