At the Wave by Vento conference in Turin on Wednesday, Oct. 7, Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. Chairman Joe Tsai warned that another country could cut off access to its technology after a change in government or circumstances. He said open-source artificial intelligence offers Europe its best route to technological independence from the US and China, and urged the region to build its own computing infrastructure to train and run AI models. The question beneath that pitch is who controls the systems people rely on.
The leverage in the warning
“No country would want to entirely trust another country's technology: if there's a change in government, a change in circumstances, they can just shut off the technology from you,” Tsai said. His warning frames dependence not as an abstract market concern, but as a possible source of leverage: one country could make its technology unavailable to another. Tsai’s answer has two parts. Europe should pursue open-source AI and build computing infrastructure of its own.
That’s the extent of the proposal in the account of his remarks. Tsai didn’t name a project, a budget, a company that should build the infrastructure, or a public body that should oversee it. He didn’t explain how Europe would make the systems available or who would control access. Those unanswered questions matter. A call for technological independence doesn’t, by itself, say whether the people using the technology gain control or whether control simply changes hands.
Independence, but on whose terms?
Tsai’s argument puts the power to withhold technology at the centre of the discussion. His own words are direct: another country could “just shut off the technology from you.” Open-source AI is his answer to that risk, along with European computing capacity for training and running models. His conference remarks don’t describe the technical or political arrangements needed to make either step possible.
Nor do they say open-source systems automatically put decision-making in the hands of the people who use them. The proposal names a destination—technological independence from the US and China—but leaves the distribution of power within it unaddressed. Who builds the infrastructure? Who decides what it runs? Who can use it? Tsai’s reported remarks provide no answers.
A corporate pitch with missing details
The speaker, Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. chairman Joe Tsai, made the case at a conference in Turin. That fact belongs beside his appeal for European independence: a corporate executive is arguing for open source and locally built infrastructure, while the account gives no details about a plan, a funding arrangement, or who would hold the keys. No specific European institution, government decision, or grassroots initiative appears in the remarks provided.
The claim is sharp, but limited. Tsai says Europe shouldn’t have to rely entirely on technology controlled elsewhere, because political changes could interrupt access. He recommends open source and European computing infrastructure. His words point toward autonomy; the missing details leave ownership and accountability open. In Turin, independence was the headline. Who gets to decide what that means was left hanging.