Italy plays leading role in Europe's supercomputing and AI innovation progress, hosting major HPC and AI research initiatives.
The computing power driving generative artificial intelligence has become a strategic priority for governments and industries worldwide. As AI models grow increasingly complex, Europe is working to close the gap with the United States and China through investments in supercomputing infrastructure and quantum computing integration. Italia has emerged as a leader in this effort, with Bologna establishing itself as a continental hub for European digital sovereignty.
A major milestone came in June with the inauguration of two systems at the Cineca centre in Bologna: Sol, a new European quantum computer, and Lisa, an upgraded version of the Leonardo supercomputer for artificial intelligence. Both resulted from collaboration between the EuroHPC Joint Undertaking, Italy's Ministry of Universities and Research, and the National Cybersecurity Agency. "With Sol and Lisa, we are strengthening our sovereign supercomputing ecosystem and offering European users new tools to innovate through AI, HPC and quantum technologies," said Anders Jensen, Executive Director of the EuroHPC JU.
The combination of classical supercomputing and quantum computing represents the frontier of computational capability. Quantum computers use qubits, which—unlike traditional bits—can represent multiple states simultaneously through quantum superposition, enabling exponential increases in computational power. This allows for solving optimization and simulation problems that would be computationally infeasible on even the most powerful supercomputers. Bologna now hosts two quantum systems: Sol, based on trapped-ion technology from Austrian firm Aqt, and the Siemens-Pasqal system, the first in Europe designed specifically for industrial applications.
Europe faces a competitive gap. According to a December McKinsey report, Europe significantly lags the United States and China in AI-dedicated computing capacity. American hyperscalers invest tens of billions in GPUs and accelerators, while Chinese technology giants benefit from coordinated state support.
The European Union responded with the European Chips Act, aimed at doubling Europe's global semiconductor production share from 10 percent to 20 percent by 2030 through over 43 billion euros in public and private investment. Yet chips alone are insufficient. Europe requires continental-scale computing infrastructure—the role of EuroHPC. The joint initiative has deployed world-class supercomputers across the continent, and Europe recently entered the exascale era with Germany's Jupiter, the first European system exceeding one billion billion operations per second.
Italia remains active: Leonardo, at Cineca, ranks among the world's most powerful supercomputers, and the Lisa upgrade provides specific capabilities for training and inference of AI models. Private investment is also advancing. In May, a consortium of Leonardo, AI4Industry and Eni proposed Italia as a candidate to host a European AI Gigafactory—a computing facility dedicated exclusively to large-scale AI model training—planned for Turin, where aerospace and automotive expertise is established. "Italia has what it takes to become a leading European hub for artificial intelligence," a consortium spokesperson said. Success would strengthen Italy's digital sovereignty strategy.
Computational sovereignty connects directly to security and strategic autonomy. Training AI models on national or European infrastructure preserves control over data, algorithms, and resulting applications—a consideration spanning scientific research and industrial and military domains. The National Cybersecurity Agency's active participation in Italy's EuroHPC projects reflects this imperative.
Significant challenges persist. Energy consumption in AI data centres is growing exponentially, raising environmental and economic sustainability questions. Specialist skill availability is another constraint: developing engineers and researchers capable of fully utilizing this infrastructure requires time and investment in training. Global competition continues unabated: as Europe launches its first exascale systems, the United States and China are already planning the next generation.
Yet Bologna's message is one of cautious optimism. Italia now possesses an ecosystem combining traditional supercomputing, quantum computing, and AI-dedicated infrastructure under European governance. It is a foundation, not an endpoint, establishing a clear direction: building technological autonomy enabling Europe to compete in the artificial intelligence economy without total dependence on external powers.