French AI startup Sesterce unveils €10 billion Finland data center project

French startup Sesterce said on Thursday, October 8, that it will invest more than €10 billion in a major AI and data center hub in Finland. The project will be built in the town of Jamsa, on the site of a former paper mill, and will develop supercomputing and computing infrastructure for artificial intelligence, according to the company's statement.

Sesterce told Agence France-Presse that work has already begun and that the "AI campus" is due to come online in 2027. The first stage will have a computing capacity of 200 megawatts, expected to rise to 600MW in a second phase, though the company did not say when that expansion would happen. Sesterce said it hopes to develop more than one gigawatt of computing overall. It also said it has secured an anchor customer but declined to name it.

The company is developing two other sites outside Finland. These will host supercomputers and data center infrastructure that other firms can rent to power their AI applications.

The article notes that Finland has attracted a series of large foreign data center investments. Such facilities need huge amounts of electricity and cooling, and Finland offers a cool climate and relatively cheap, stable power supplies, much of it generated without fossil fuels. The Sesterce project adds to that pattern of investment in the country.