Ownership of models, embedded corporate knowledge matters more than server location, Nadella says

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella says datacenter location is "the least important thing" for AI sovereignty.

In a chat with BlackRock CEO Larry Fink at the Davos World Economic Forum, SatNad argued that corporate AI sovereignty hinges on control over models trained on proprietary knowledge, not the physcial infrastructure location.

"If you're not able to embed the tacit knowledge of the firm in a set of weights in a model that you control, by definition you have no sovereignty. That means you're leaking enterprise value to some model somewhere."

He added: "In fact, the datacenter, where it runs, is the least important thing."

"In the AI era, the topic that's least talked about, but I feel will be most talked about in this calendar year, will be the sovereignty of a firm," Nadella continued.

The reframing follows Microsoft's struggles with traditional data sovereignty. The software and cloud ...