Together with partners from business, science and politics, we celebrated the topping-out ceremony for Europe’s largest AI factory in Berlin. Together with NVIDIA, we at Deutsche Telekom and T-Systems are investing around one billion euros in the expansion of a Munich data center into an Industrial AI Cloud. In addition, SAP and Deutsche Telekom are working together to create a secure and high-performance digital infrastructure for public institutions and defense.
The Industrial AI Cloud will be available to German and European companies as early as the first quarter of 2026. After only six months of preparation, we are laying the foundation for the next industrial revolution.
We are equipping our AI factory with 10,000 NVIDIA GPUs of the latest generation – DGX B200 and RTX Pro 6000 – and thus increasing AI computing power in Germany by around 50 percent in a very short time. It will have the computing power of a supercomputer that can perform 500 quadrillion operations per second. It has 20 petabytes of storage space, is energy-efficient and meets the highest safety and quality requirements – according to German and European law.
With our purely privately financed Industrial AI Cloud, we are creating a sovereign offering for large companies, medium-sized companies and start-ups – including applications in mechanical engineering, manufacturing, logistics, robotics, simulation and digital twins. Partners such as SAP have been part of our ecosystem from the very beginning and contribute their solutions for platform, simulation, LLM development and robotics.
We provide the physical infrastructure, SAP provides the SAP Business Technology Platform and applications – including modern AI technologies. In the future, all digital solutions for public institutions and defence will be developed on the common “Germany Stack”. In this way, we guarantee the highest standards of data protection, security and reliability – digital sovereignty “Made in Germany”.
This makes our AI factory the first lighthouse project of the "Made for Germany" corporate initiative and sends a strong signal for the digital sovereignty and industrial competitiveness of Germany and Europe.
Why do we do all this? Because we are at the beginning of a new industrial age. Artificial intelligence is revolutionizing value creation and competitiveness to an extent that we have not seen since electrification. The major language models have shown how radically communication and knowledge transfer can change. But the real lever for Germany and Europe does not lie in chat bots – but in AI applications for industry.
This is where the future of our prosperity takes place: in digitized factories, in automated supply chains, in virtual development environments. Whoever masters industrial AI determines the competitiveness of entire economies. This is a historic opportunity.
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Yes, the starting position is challenging: In generative AI models, the USA and China dominate. You have the computing power, the investment power, the scale. ChatGPT, Grok, Gemini, DeepSeek, etc. are the top dogs here. Europe is lagging behind at this point. BUT: Our economy has its strengths exactly where AI will have its greatest impact in the future: in mechanical engineering, in manufacturing, in logistics, in robotics.
Industrial expertise, engineering, SME power and a lot of valuable industrial data – these are advantages that we must finally translate into digital leadership. Because one thing is clear: digital sovereignty does not arise through use, but only through design.
This means that we must own the infrastructure and the software platforms on which industrial AI is created, trained and operated. Otherwise, we will remain users – and others will decide our technological fate.
Industrial AI requires massive computing power, valid data and reliable platforms. But it also needs security, compliance and control. Anyone who processes critical production data or development models on infrastructures outside Europe gives up strategic control. That is the opposite of sovereignty.
Therefore, the question does not arise: Should we invest at this point? But rather: How quickly do we build our own AI infrastructure? If we don't act now, we risk dependencies that we won't be able to solve in the future.
Mechanical engineering and industry have made this country strong. But here, too, we are challenged. AI is a huge opportunity. It will help to improve our products and strengthen our European strengths. In just six months, we turn an idea into real AI computing power, Made for Germany.
Tim Höttges, CEO Deutsche Telekom
That's why we at Deutsche Telekom and T-Systems are now going on the offensive: Together with NVIDIA, we are building Europe's largest AI factory in Munich. To this end, we have completely renovated an existing data center and equipped it with 10,000 high-performance AI chips, so-called GPUs (Graphic Processing Units). Unlike traditional computer processors (CPUs), GPUs can perform many tasks at the same time. For this reason, they are indispensable for computationally intensive AI applications. Specifically, we use NVIDIA GPUs of the latest generation: DGX B200 and RTX Pro 6000. This will increase AI computing power in Germany by around 50 percent in one fell swoop – a huge improvement in a very short time.
The other key data of our joint AI factory are also impressive. For example, it offers:
To put this into perspective: If every person on earth (about 8 billion) were to perform a computing operation per second, the entire human race would need over two million years to achieve what a supercomputer with a performance of 0.5 exaflops can do in a single second.
And the storage space of 20 petabytes would be enough to archive over 4 million movies in HD quality. Thus, practically the entire work of the Hollywood dream factory fits into our – soon to be very real – AI factory.
For the installation of the 10,000 chips, we bring about 150 truck deliveries of hardware to the location of our data center. A total of 75 kilometers of fiber optic cable will be laid to connect all GPUs and the data center site itself. This work is carried out by robots from the company Agile Robots, among others. In the final expansion, our server park will have a size of 3,000 square meters, meets the highest security and quality standards and will be operated fully energy-efficiently.
Our AI factory will open its doors as early as the first quarter of 2026 – just under six months after the start of the modernization work. So we at Deutsche Telekom and T-Systems are leading the way and, with the AI factory, are creating a first lighthouse project for the "Made for Germany" corporate initiative, which aims to strengthen Germany as a business location in the long term. Speed instead of announcements – that's what it's all about now to keep our industry competitive in the long term.
Germany's strength in engineering and industry is legendary and is now being expanded by AI. With the world's first Industrial AI Cloud and one of the largest deployments of GPUs in Germany, we're bringing NVIDIA AI and robotics here to usher in a new era of industrial transformation.
Jensen Huang, CEO NVIDIA
From left: Ferri Abolhassan (CEO T-Systems), Jensen Huang (CEO NVIDIA) and Tim Höttges (CEO Deutsche Telekom)
The demand for secure AI resources under European law is already enormous – in large-scale industry, but also in SMEs and start-ups. This is not only shown by current surveys, but also by our own customers on a regular basis.
As a speedboat, our AI factory addresses precisely these requirements: fast connectivity, data protection at EU level, high performance at the industrial level – and all this combined with a strong partner ecosystem: While we as Telekom and T-Systems provide the connectivity, the data center and cyber security, NVIDIA supplies state-of-the-art GPUs and SAP its leading Business Technology Platform (BTP). On this platform, we jointly offer countless business applications for the B2B sector, for public administration and national security – including state-of-the-art AI services.
We offer our customers easy access in three different ways: They can book the computing power of the GPU alone, together with pre-trained AI models from our T Cloud, the only sovereign alternative to hyperscalers in Europe, or in combination with managed services. Maximum connectivity and security are ensured in all cases.
And that's not all: Under the umbrella of our Industrial AI Cloud, a broad ecosystem of leading companies is formed. These include Siemens, EY, Agile Robots, Wandelbots, Quantum Systems, PhysicsX and Perplexity.
In this way, we form an end-to-end technology stack for Germany – open, secure and sovereign. In this way, we turn the treasure trove of data and process know-how of the German economy into better products and services in a secure technology stack – with AI at the highest level.
Our joint customers can use this stack to simulate production facilities, conduct digital wind tunnel tests for cars and aircraft, develop crash tests virtually, train robot controllers, and train and operate their own AI models. Any type of application that requires high AI computing power can be used easily, securely and confidently in Germany.
And this flexibility is crucial: one infrastructure, countless use cases – confidently orchestrated across national and company borders. Our AI factory offers all of this – with the T Cloud as a central access route. This is unique in this form in Germany and Europe. Ferri Abolhassan, Member of the Board of Management of Deutsche Telekom & CEO T-Systems
One infrastructure, countless use cases – confidently orchestrated across national and company borders. Our AI factory offers all of this – with the T Cloud as a central access route. This is unique in this form in Germany and Europe.
Dr. Ferri Abolhassan, CEO T-Systems & Board Member Deutsche Telekom
It is important to us that our infrastructure project is financed purely by the private sector – NVIDIA and we at Deutsche Telekom are contributing around one billion euros here. It runs independently of European funding programs such as the AI Gigafactory initiatives. Because we don't want to wait for the lengthy approval process to be completed. We act – now, on our own, with our own money! And if demand continues to rise, we have already gained initial experience and can quickly scale our solution.
Because the AI factory is not the end point for us. It is the beginning. At the same time, we are laying the foundation for an AI Gigafactory on German soil, with up to 100,000 GPUs. For a new era of European industrial expertise – driven by artificial intelligence. Our message is: Germany can. Europe can. So let's get started!
We are facing a historic opportunity. We must not gamble them away. AI value creation must take place with us, through us, not past us. Digital sovereignty needs bold investments, not waiting. Every week we wait widens the gap in the global AI race. Every decision in favor of sovereign infrastructure, on the other hand, strengthens our future viability.
Germany and Europe are strong when we concentrate on our strengths: industry, engineering, implementation competence. Now it is a matter of translating these strengths into a digital leadership role. With courage, with speed, with strategic clarity.
