NVIDIA Vice President for Europe, the Middle East and Africa Paolo Guglielmini said Egypt can build a strong artificial intelligence infrastructure ecosystem, highlighting the country’s access to utilities, telecommunications investments, data center expertise, investors and a growing community of entrepreneurs and developers
Guglielmini said NVIDIA is working to expand AI infrastructure in Egypt, pointing to the presence of partners with access to utilities, investments in telecommunications businesses and experience in building AI-focused data centers in other markets
He added that investors are interested in the opportunity, while the Egyptian government is increasingly supportive of creating an ecosystem that can enable further AI infrastructure development
“We’re here to work with everyone and try to make things happen quickly,” Guglielmini said, describing NVIDIA’s approach to expanding AI infrastructure capabilities in Egypt
Addressing the role of data and artificial intelligence, Guglielmini described data as a source of wealth and emphasized the importance of proprietary data.
He said preserving data and ensuring that its benefits can be captured locally could create new wealth and economic opportunities
Guglielmini also said he is a firm believer that AI is a force for good, pointing to its potential to address major productivity challenges across large parts of the developed world while creating broader social and economic opportunities
He highlighted AI’s potential to lower barriers to entrepreneurship, noting that people do not necessarily need access to the most expensive education to build significant businesses if they have access to open-source software and computing resources located elsewhere in the world
On NVIDIA’s support for Egyptian startups, Guglielmini described the company’s work with entrepreneurs as one of the aspects that makes him particularly proud of being part of NVIDIA
He said the company approaches startup support with a high degree of sincerity, while the NVIDIA Inception program provides startups with access to technical expertise, potential customers and a network of people working in AI
The program can also provide startups with access to computing resources, training and opportunities to scale their businesses, which Guglielmini described as particularly helpful for young entrepreneurs
Asked whether NVIDIA plans to establish a venture capital fund for Egyptian startups, Guglielmini said Egypt already has healthy venture capital activity, but emphasized that expanding access to computing infrastructure is a more immediate priority for startups
“Without compute, you cannot invest, you cannot grow,” he said, adding that Egypt already has more than enough entrepreneurs, startups and talented developers, but needs to make computing resources available to them so they can scale their businesses. He said venture capital activity would then follow
On cooperation between NVIDIA and the Egyptian government, Guglielmini described the relationship as very positive, pointing to what he called a good dialogue and a willingness to move quickly
“We’re going to keep working on it and hopefully have something interesting to report soon,” he said
