When people hear Lidl, most imagine long aisles lined with shelves and groceries. But Schwarz Gruppe, the group that owns the Lidl and Kaufland retail chains, now has completely different plans. Its founder, Dieter Schwarz, one of Germany's richest men, is investing billions of euros in the development of artificial intelligence. And his goal? To achieve independence from the US and China in the digital world.
From selling groceries to artificial intelligence
Europe is trying to narrow the technological lead of the US and China. And the Schwarz Gruppe initiative has now taken on this very task. According to Bloomberg, the group began operating its own cloud service called STACKIT back in 2017. One of the reasons was that American providers were unable to guarantee exactly where the group's data was stored.
Ultimately, the side project became a fully fledged division called Schwarz Digits, which, according to Business Insider, generated revenue of €1.9 billion in the 2024/25 fiscal year.
A giant data center: 100,000 chips for European AI
The turning point came in July 2025, when Schwarz Gruppe offered the German government to take charge of building one of the so-called AI gigafactories, a giant data center. The development of these centers is supported by the European Union through a €20 billion fund. A gigafactory differs from conventional centers in that the site houses at least 100,000 cutting-edge chips used to develop and train large AI models.
However, the group had already laid the foundation stone for its own data center in Brandenburg's Lübbenau last year. The total investment amounts to €11 billion and is the largest one-time investment in the group's history.
A strong ally in Deutsche Telekom
Schwarz Gruppe is also working with Deutsche Telekom, and this partnership is expected to be crucial for Germany. Both companies are seeking European support to build an AI gigafactory, while Canadian investor Brookfield has been mentioned as a potential financial partner.
Moreover, Deutsche Telekom is no newcomer to artificial intelligence. Together with Nvidia, it is building its own AI data center equipped with 10,000 graphics chips. The project is expected to cost one billion euros. France is also pursuing greater independence in artificial intelligence and plans to invest tens of billions of euros in the technology.
Who will prevail
The US and China currently dominate the world of artificial intelligence. If Europe fails to join this technological revolution in time, it risks becoming nothing more than a digital colony. Dieter Schwarz's vision is therefore actually simple. He wants European data to remain in Europe and the continent not to be a mere spectator in the development of the key technology of the 21st century. And so far, it appears that growing capacity could help narrow the gap between Europe and the leading powers in AI.
Sources: Cybernews, Business Insider, fDi Intelligence, Seznam Zprávy
