Chile seeks to create the first center ofand artificial intelligence computing in Latin America next year, to support research, start-up development, announced this Wednesday the Minister of Science, Aisén Etcheverry.
He also explained that the development bank of Latin America and the Caribbean CAF is working on a feasibility study so that the center can be installed in Chile and have the capacity to provide services to the rest of the region.
“Our aspiration is to have the first artificial intelligence computing center in Latin America in Chile, hopefully no later than 2025,” said the minister in a meeting with foreign correspondents.
Current data centers in the country “They are not necessarily built or designed to be able to train algorithms, and if we want this industry to move forward, and that these capabilities exist, the need for this infrastructure becomes quite evident,” he added.
According to the National Center for Artificial Intelligence, Cenia, of Chile, the country is one of the which is best positioned for technology development, as it is fourth in the world for fixed broadband speed and there is widespread use of cloud computing.
Etcheverry also pointed out that in parallel there is an initiative from the University of Tarapacá, in the north of the country, to create a centre in that area with wide availability of clean energy, in addition to a possible expansion of a supercomputer that works with all the universities in the country.
“These combined initiatives will be complemented with public resources and I would say that by the end of the year, beginning of next year we should have a call for proposals financed with public resources. to complement some of these initiatives and thus quickly achieve that capacity,” he said.
The amount of public funding has not been defined, but Etcheverry hopes that it could reach around US$25 million. He also said that during a visit to the United States, he spoke with Nvidia about the country’s desire to have artificial intelligence computing capacity.
“While we do not have an investment commitment with Nvidia, there is interest and groups working to see if something of this nature would be possible,” he said.
The CAF initiative is to develop roadmaps for the construction high-performance computing centers in Chile and the Dominican Republic, according to its website.
“The bet is that if we have a first computing centre in the north, powered by renewable energy, which does not have to be too big, (…) “The interest of investors in being able to establish themselves is much more evident,” said Etcheverry.
