Von der Leyen Puts AI at the Center of EU Policy

Artificial intelligence was one of the two subjects Ursula von der Leyen built her September 16, 2026 State of the Union address around, alongside climate change. Her framing was an endorsement rather than a caution: in German, „Wir wollen KI“ — we want AI. What the speech did not carry was any new rule aimed at the technology itself.

The industrial shortlist

Brussels intends to push AI into five sectors first: health, transport, agriculture and food, advanced manufacturing, and defense and space. Initiatives covering them are slated for November 2026. Von der Leyen sketched a technology landing in factories, hospitals, power grids and defense systems. The AI Act appeared in her account as a settled building block, not as a starting point for tightening.

Two conditions, little machinery

The endorsement came with two attached conditions: AI should create more value and do so more responsibly, with lower energy consumption and with humans keeping control. Neither the measurement nor the enforcement of that lower consumption was spelled out. For minors she flagged an EU Kids Act with age verification for social networks. On labor, she pointed to a Quality Jobs Act due by the end of 2026.

What the speech left out

The gap netzpolitik.org presses on is water. Von der Leyen did address it — rivers such as the Danube, the Rhine and the Garonne are vanishing in front of us, she said — and announced a European water initiative. She did not connect that to the data centers her AI agenda depends on. The report also reads the employment effects as marginalized, notes that business associations reject added regulation outright, and places the whole speech inside a Commission course aimed at deregulation.

Sovereignty, tested the same day

The gap between ambition and capacity showed on the same date. Canada's Cohere is taking over Heidelberg-based Aleph Alpha, with CEO Aidan Gomez stating the merger agreement is concluded and signed. The combined company is pitched as a Canadian-German technology champion, backed by an announced Germany-Canada alliance for technological sovereignty, and aimed squarely at US incumbents OpenAI and Anthropic. Gomez was candid about where Europe stands: ahead on sovereignty, behind on quality.

Open questions

None of the reporting reviewed here attaches euro figures to the announced AI plans, so this article attaches none. For the Cohere-Aleph Alpha deal, the purchase price, valuation, headcount and the name of the merged entity are not established by the sources read. A third report, from the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, could not be retrieved and was not used; nothing in it is confirmed or disputed here.