- Canada has never provided an official definition of “sovereign AI,” allowing the concept to form loosely through data center funding decisions, domestic cloud partnerships, and data residency requirements.
- According to author Joshua van Es, this approach makes the application of “sovereignty” inconsistent, relying on infrastructure location rather than actual control.
- Canada’s AI Minister Evan Solomon describes AI as a Gutenberg-level turning point, directly affecting power, knowledge, and national capabilities.
- However, projects labeled as “sovereign AI,” such as Nokia’s expansion in Ottawa or Microsoft’s data centers, are evaluated mainly based on their location in Canada and domestic job creation.
- Core questions such as who holds the encryption keys, who has administrative access rights, or which laws govern the system are largely left unanswered.
- This creates an incentive for Canadian startups to prioritize rapid deployment on foreign platforms to meet formal requirements, while technical and legal control is pushed externally.
- A prime example is the government’s investment in Cohere, yet the compute infrastructure is operated by US-based CoreWeave, subject to US laws.
- The long-term consequence is that businesses may be “culturally Canadian” but governed by foreign legal and operational processes, weakening the ability to serve the public sector and sensitive industries.
- The author argues that technological sovereignty must be measured by “authority”—the final decision-making power when crises, disputes, or security demands arise.
📌 Canada has never officially defined “sovereign AI,” allowing the concept to form loosely through data center funding, domestic cloud partnerships, and data residency requirements. Consequently, “sovereignty” is applied inconsistently, relying on infrastructure location rather than true control. Businesses optimize for rapid deployment on foreign platforms to meet geographic requirements while lacking technical and legal control. For example, despite government investment in Cohere, the compute infrastructure is operated by US-based CoreWeave, subject to US law. If Canada wants to build a sustainable AI ecosystem, sovereignty standards need to shift from “where” to “who has the power,” so that value, knowledge, and strategic capabilities truly accumulate domestically.
