France sees global A.I. regulation ideas by the end of this year, wants to work with U.S. on tech laws
PARIS — France’s top politicians told CNBC they see the beginnings of global regulation on artificial intelligence coming by the end of this year, with French President Emmanuel Macron saying the country wants to work with the U.S. on rules around the fast-growing technology.
The comments come as interest in AI, sparked by the rapid growth of chatbot ChatGPT, continues to rise and governments around the world debate how the technology should be regulated.
But there is no global consensus on how AI should be managed and controlled with the U.S., China and European Union taking different approaches to rules around the tech. Any global regulatory framework would be a huge feat.
France has looked to position itself as the European hub for AI development even as the European Union, of which France is a member, pushes forward with first-of-its kind regulation.
Macron, Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire and Digital Minister Jean-Noel Barrot, all spoke to CNBC on Wednesday at the VivaTech conference in Paris, expressing a desire for global regulation on AI.
“From my point of view … I think we do need a regulation and all the players, even the U.S. players, agree with that. I think we need a global regulation,” Macron told CNBC’s Karen Tso on the sidelines of the event.
Barrot said that by the end of the year, “some of the core principles that we would like for the regulation of AI in G7 countries and like minded countries will start to emerge.”
The G7 includes countries such as France, Germany the U.S. and U.K. The countries agreed this year to set up a working group to look at issues that may arise from AI.
Macron said the G7 and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), which includes 38 countries, would be a “good platform” to develop global regulation.
Why now?
French concerns over EU A.I. law
France’s call for global AI regulation comes as the European Union closes in on passing an unprecedented law called the EU AI Act. The European Parliament on Wednesday approved the bloc’s landmark law, which looks to take a risk-based approach to regulating AI.
The latest amendments to the law include a tougher stance on so-called generative AI, the type of technology that underpins OpenAI’s ChatGPT, which allows systems to create images or respond in text to prompts. The regulation states generative AI developers will be required to submit their systems for review before releasing them commercially.
The law still needs approval from other EU bodies.
France, which has traditionally taken a pro-regulatory stance, has expressed concern that the EU law around AI has gone to far.
“My worry is that in the recent past few weeks, the EU Parliament … has taken a very sort of strong stance on AI regulation, using in some sense this AI act as a way to try and solve too many problems at once,” Barrot said on the provisions around generative AI.
U.S. rivalry and partnership in focus
Even as an EU-level law continues to work through the legislative process, France is pushing for regulations on a global scale and it sees the U.S. as a key ally.
“Competition is always a good thing. So we have a very close cooperation with the U.S. but we also want to get access to our own AI intelligence and companies,” Le Maire told CNBC on the sidelines of VivaTech.
“On regulation as well, I think this is absolutely vital to have an in-depth discussion with the American authorities on the best way of regulating artificial intelligence,” he added.
The U.S. has not yet come up with any kind of framework for AI regulation. But American companies are some of the most prominent in the space with OpenAI, the firm behind ChatGPT, as well as chipmaker Nvidia being the leaders in the space.
What do the French want in terms of regulation?
France’s top politicians who spoke to CNBC discussed their focus for AI regulation.
“We want to be sure that this is safe, unbiased … that the language models we have are not biased and that what is … forbidden in society is forbidden in this model. So we need some rules,” Macron said.
AI like ChatGPT is trained on huge amounts of data called large language models that allow it to understand human language and respond. But there are concerns that the data it is trained on could cause that system to inherit biases.
Macron also said that if you are watching a video or looking at a photo that has been created by AI, a user has a right to know.
Ultimately, French politicians are weighing up regulation that balances the need for protecting users of the technology without stifling innovation.
“What we want is a regulation that offers both protection for users … and that establishes trust, but that is also very flexible enough to allow for the development in the next few weeks, next few months in France and Europe,” Barrot said.
Alibaba‘s Hong Kong-listed shares surged on Wednesday to reach their highest point since 2021 after the company said it will invest more in artificial intelligence and rolled out new AI products and updates.
Shares of the company jumped over 6%, while its total gains year to date rose above 107%.
The tech giant plans to increase spending on AI models and infrastructure development, on top of the 380 billion yuan ($53 billion) over three years it announced in February, Chief Executive Officer Eddie Wu said Wednesday at Alibaba Cloud’s annual flagship technology conference.
“We are vigorously advancing a three-year, 380 billion [yuan] AI infrastructure initiative with plans to sustain and further increase our investment according to our strategic vision in anticipation of the [artificial superintelligence] era,” Wu said.
Alibaba shares surge after CEO unveils plans to boost AI spending
So-called ‘artificial superintelligence’ refers to AI that would hypothetically surpass the power and intelligence of the human brain, with the hypothetical benchmark becoming a growing focus of major AI companies.
Alibaba also officially unveiled the latest version of its Qwen large language models — the Qwen3-Max — on Wednesday, along with a series of other updates to its suite of AI product offerings.
Wu highlighted that Alibaba Cloud is strategically positioned as a “full-stack AI service provider,” delivering the computing power required for training and deploying large AI models on the cloud through its own data centers.
“The cumulative investment in global AI in the next five years will exceed $4 trillion, and this is the largest investment in computing power and research and development in history,” he added.
A person walks by a sign for Micron Technology headquarters in San Jose, California, on June 25, 2025.
Justin Sullivan | Getty Images
Micron reported better-than-expected earnings and revenue on Tuesday as well as a robust forecast for the current quarter.
The stock rose in extended trading.
Here’s how the company did in comparison with the LSEG consensus:
- Earnings per share: $3.03, adjusted, vs. $2.86 expected
- Revenue: $11.32 billion vs. $11.22 billion expected
Micron said revenue in the current period, its fiscal first quarter, will be about $12.5 billion, versus the $11.94 billion average analyst estimate per LSEG.
The company said it had $3.2 billion, or $2.83 per share in net income, versus $887 million, or 79 cents in the year-ago period.
Micron shares have nearly doubled so far in 2025. The company makes memory and storage, which are important components for computers. Micron has been one of the winners of the artificial intelligence boom. That’s because high-end AI chips like those made by Nvidia require increasing amounts of high-tech memory called high-bandwidth memory, which Micron makes.
“As the only U.S.-based memory manufacturer, Micron is uniquely positioned to capitalize on the AI opportunity ahead,” Micron CEO Sanjay Mehrotra said in a statement.
Overall company revenue rose 46% on a year-over-year basis during the quarter.
Micron’s largest unit, which sells memory for cloud providers, reported $4.54 billion in sales during the quarter, more than tripling on a year-over-year basis.
However, the company’s core data center business unit saw sales decline 22% on an annual basis to $1.57 billion in revenue.
WATCH: AI-led bull market set to continue, says Wells Fargo’s Ohsung Kwon
-
Sports3 years ago‘Storybook stuff’: Inside the night Bryce Harper sent the Phillies to the World Series
-
Sports1 year agoStory injured on diving stop, exits Red Sox game
-
Sports2 years agoGame 1 of WS least-watched in recorded history
-
Sports2 years agoButton battles heat exhaustion in NASCAR debut
-
Sports3 years agoMLB Rank 2023: Ranking baseball’s top 100 players
-
Sports4 years ago
Team Europe easily wins 4th straight Laver Cup
-
Environment2 years agoJapan and South Korea have a lot at stake in a free and open South China Sea
-
Environment12 months agoHere are the best electric bikes you can buy at every price level in October 2024