Business Daily – "The Global AI Divide"

Podcast: Business Daily (BBC World Service)
Episode Date: September 15, 2025
Host: Hannah Mullane

Episode Overview

This episode explores the growing global divide in artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure, investment, and influence between the world’s two dominant players—the United States and China—and the rest of the world. Host Hannah Mullane discusses the various economic, technical, and political barriers lesser-resourced countries face, highlighting real-world voices from Argentina, Kenya, and Europe. The episode examines how countries and companies are forced to adapt, innovate, and strategize to secure a place in the AI-powered future.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Scale of the AI Investment Race

• Massive Investments in the US and China: The US and China together account for 90% of the world’s AI infrastructure. Apple, Oracle, SoftBank, and OpenAI are investing hundreds of billions of dollars to build their AI sectors.
  • [01:41] Hannah Mullane: “It may be unsurprising that two countries, the U.S. and China, dominate in this field. Between them, they’re responsible for 90% of the world’s artificial intelligence infrastructure.”
• Other Countries Lagging: Europe and developing nations face capital limitations, instability, and the “brain drain” of AI experts emigrating for better opportunities.

2. The Argentine Perspective – Innovation Despite Constraints

• Improvising with Limited Resources:
  • [03:06] Hannah Mullane introduces Nicholas Volovic, a computer science professor running a modest AI hub in Argentina using repurposed servers from 2012.
• Funding Roadblocks:
  • [04:17] Nicholas Volovic (05:25): “The brightest minds in chemistry, astrophysics, computer science, biology, they go to work for data science and AI companies abroad. And you cannot do anything to get them. What can you offer them? A good hardware? No... a good salary? No...”
• The Sovereignty Argument:
  • [04:38] Nicholas Volovic [sovereignty argument]: “If you don’t have people that understand and can handle that technology, that can adapt that technology, you will always be part of a company or other governments that give you the infrastructure and the knowledge. So it’s a kind of sovereignty argument that we are trying to use.”

3. AI Infrastructure as a Geopolitical Asset

• Strategic Importance:
  • [07:07] Ryan Reynolds (paraphrasing expert opinion): “If you host AI hardware within your borders, it does give a government territorial jurisdiction to, say, impose regulations that can govern and shape the development of these very influential technologies.”
• National Security and Competition:
  • [07:29] Ryan Reynolds (on behalf of Zoe Hawkins, Oxford Internet Institute): “For many, it’s an issue of national security. They might make the argument that with increasing geopolitical tensions, there’s a greater appetite for supply chain resilience and a fear about international disruptions.”
• Policy Incentives: Governments worldwide are deploying tax breaks and incentives to attract private investment for new data centers and AI-focused enterprises.

4. The African and Kenyan Experience – Adapting to Scarcity

• Resource Constraints and Creative Workarounds:
  • [11:31] Shiko Gittel (CEO, Carla, Kenya): “We have to optimize for when there’s low resource constraints... like 4am, 5am ... because then Kenya has not woken up, Europe has not woken up, the US is sleeping... So the only person you’re competing with is China and India.”
• Dependence on Foreign Infrastructure:
  • [13:10] Shiko Gittel: “Most of our data does not reside in Africa. In fact, when you say it, I mean, it was so embarrassing. The claim is we don’t have enough capacity to host all our data here, But Africa has 11,000 data centers. How good are they? We don’t know… right now we are relying on the big tech companies to host our data.”
• Innovation Under Constraint:
  • [14:10] Shiko Gittel: “There’s a team ... that is looking at something we’re calling resource constraint AI, which looks at how do we build AI in our resource constraint environment. But we cannot wait for everything to be perfect. To start playing... We actually innovate for constraint.”

5. Europe’s Push for Tech Sovereignty

• Rise of ‘Sovereign Cloud Providers’:
  • [15:35] Matthias Neubauer (CEO, Exoscale, European cloud provider): “Generally speaking, people and businesses are a little bit worried and concerned if they’re not in full control of something, and political developments in the last couple of months certainly made people more concerned and more worried about having full control of the infrastructure.”
• Infrastructure Gap and Trade Barriers:
  • [16:30] Matthias Neubauer: “Europe and other parts of the world definitely have to step up their game. And it’s not easy because it requires a lot of capital expenditure. And then there’s also things like trade restrictions coming into play. So certain powerful chips cannot be sold to certain countries due to trade restrictions. From the U.S. for example. The world today is the slowest it will ever be.”

6. The Role of Private Companies and International Organizations

• Commercial, not Equitable, Investment Decisions:
  • [17:35] Zoe Hawkins (Oxford Internet Institute): “So these decisions about investments are being made on commercial terms and not being directed on the basis of equity and or even need. ... It’s a much bigger question as to how do we direct foreign private sector companies to invest in places that isn’t their highest return.”
• Global Reliance on US and Chinese ‘Tech Stacks’:
  • [18:38] Zoe Hawkins: “...of the 33 countries that have AI compute, 18 of them relied on providers from either just China or the U.S. so it sort of aligned with one global powers tech stack. So we had 13 countries relying only on U.S. hyperscaler infrastructure, whereas five were relying only on Chinese hyperscalers.”

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Resourceful Innovation:
  • [03:40] Nicholas Volovic (Argentina): “We used very old servers from Supermicro that were from 2012, and we repurposed them adding GPUs... It was the only way to get something related to AI working.”
• On the Reality of Brain Drain:
  • [05:25] Nicholas Volovic: “The brightest minds in ... computer science, biology, they go to work for data science and AI companies abroad. And you cannot do anything to get them.”
• On African Innovation:
  • [14:10] Shiko Gittel (Kenya): “We actually innovate for constraint.”
• On the Relentless Pace of Change:
  • [16:44] Matthias Neubauer (Europe): “The world today is the slowest it will ever be. It will continue to only move faster, and AI will most certainly accelerate that process.”
• On AI Infrastructure Ownership:
  • [18:38] Zoe Hawkins: “When we look at who owns these companies that run the data centers, we found that ... 18 of them relied on providers from either just China or the U.S. ... There was 12 countries ... you could describe as hedging, having a mix of providers from the us, China and Europe.”

Timestamps for Major Segments

• [01:00] – Episode theme introduction by Hannah Mullane
• [02:01] – Matthias Neubauer on the global infrastructure gap
• [03:06] - [05:49] – Nicholas Volovic, AI hub struggles in Argentina
• [07:07 - 08:22] – Zoe Hawkins on strategic importance and investment decisions
• [11:31 - 14:57] – Shiko Gittel, Carla (Kenya): Working around infrastructure gaps, creative innovation, and the problem of data sovereignty
• [15:35 - 17:12] – Matthias Neubauer, Exoscale (Europe): Sovereign clouds and trade barriers
• [17:35 - 18:38] – Zoe Hawkins: Commercial motives and the risks of global reliance on US/China tech stacks
• [19:29] – Host wraps up with reflections on the future

Conclusion & Takeaways

• The global AI landscape is dominated by the US and China, who wield near-complete control over infrastructure and investment.
• Countries with fewer resources have to adapt creatively—repurposing old equipment, shifting work hours, relying on foreign data storage, and focusing on innovation born of necessity.
• Increasing geopolitical tensions and national security concerns are encouraging governments to push for sovereignty in digital infrastructure.
• Ultimately, the growth of AI is accelerating rapidly, and only creative policymaking, determined local initiative, and international collaboration will prevent less wealthy nations from being left behind.

For further insights into AI’s impact around the globe, stay tuned for the next episode of Business Daily’s series on artificial intelligence.