Arkady Volozh’s Nebius Group has entered into a strategic agreement with the American Palantir Technologies, under which it will become its priority partner in the infrastructure of “sovereign artificial intelligence.” Once the integration is complete, Palantir commercial customers will be able to run and serve artificial intelligence models on Nebius compute infrastructure directly within Palantir’s secure footprint.
The essence of the agreement is to combine Palantir’s software platform – AIP, Ontology, Foundry and Apollo – with Nebius’ cloud infrastructure and computing power. Customers will be able to use open AI models, further train them on their own data, and at the same time maintain control over data, models and computing resources. The companies also intend to jointly accelerate the commissioning of new capacities, in particular by installing modular data centers where there is already access to the necessary electricity.
“The Nebius compute infrastructure gives you the ability to run your own AI models in environments you control. Our ontology and their infrastructure will be the foundation of the sovereignty our partners demand,” said Palantir CEO Alex Karp.
Nebius founder and CEO Arkady Volozh emphasized that large organizations simultaneously need large computing power and the ability to independently control data and models.
The agreement initially sent Nebius shares soaring, but nearly all of that gain was lost over the next two trading sessions.
Investing.com notes that the partnership could have implications beyond its immediate financials, with Palantir getting specialized GPU infrastructure built into its own secure environment, and Nebius getting access to companies and regulated industries that are critical of where their data is physically located and who controls their models.
The concept of “sovereign AI” is especially sought after by governments, financial institutions, industrial companies and other clients who do not want to be completely dependent on the traditional cloud platforms of Amazon, Microsoft and Google.
At the same time, the partnership also caused a critical reaction in parts of the European technology community. Palantir remains a politically contentious partner due to its close cooperation with the US military and intelligence agencies, as well as large government contracts. Some critics have questioned the very idea of promoting European “sovereign AI” in partnership with the US-based Palantir.