Industrial Policy & Trade Monitor· 2667 actions· ✨ 89 recent

Thailand's Board of Investment issued Notification No. 9/2568 on 14 November 2025, amending the Activity List Eligible for Investment Promotion by splitting the prior single data-center category into two tiers based on power-usage efficiency: high-efficiency data centers (PUE ≤ 1.3) qualify for an 8-year corporate income tax (CIT) exemption, while other data centers receive a 5-year CIT exemption. A precursor restructure (Notification No. 5/2568, 5 June 2025) first introduced the two-tier category split; Notification 9/2568 added location-differentiated terms based on the Eastern Economic Corridor (EEC). New benefit conditions require applicants to submit a Thailand-benefit plan — training programmes, academic/R&D partnerships, local supply-chain support, or knowledge transfer to Thai nationals — that must be implemented before CIT exemption benefits can be exercised.

The French state, via the Agence des participations de l'État (APE), signed a contract on 1 August 2025 to acquire Atos's Advanced Computing division — encompassing the High Performance Computing & Quantum and Business Computing & AI units, commercially known as Bull — for an enterprise value of up to EUR 410 million (later adjusted to up to EUR 404 million after scope changes). The division employs over 2,500 people, mostly in France, generates roughly EUR 800 million in expected 2025 revenue, and operates Europe's only supercomputer manufacturing plant (Angers), including delivery of the EuroHPC JUPITER exascale system. The Ministry of Economy and Finance framed the acquisition as keeping "strategic industrial activities and key technologies" in French hands; the deal closed on 31 March 2026 with the French state as Bull's sole shareholder.

On 1 July 2025 India's Union Cabinet approved the Research Development and Innovation (RDI) Scheme, a six-year, ₹1,00,000 crore (≈USD 11.68 bn) fund to catalyse private-sector investment in research, development and innovation, with ₹20,000 crore allocated for FY2025-26. The scheme finances transformative RDI projects (TRL 4 and above) in strategic and sunrise sectors — deep tech, AI, biotechnology, quantum computing, robotics, space, energy transition and the digital economy — through long-tenor, low-or-nil-interest loans and equity, up to 50% of assessed project cost. Grants and short-term loans are explicitly excluded. Funds flow through a Special Purpose Fund under ANRF (first-level) to second-level fund managers — Alternate Investment Funds, Development Finance Institutions, NBFCs, and focused research bodies including the Technology Development Board (TDB) and BIRAC — which began issuing project calls in February 2026.

Vietnam's government issued Decree No. 160/2025/ND-CP establishing the National Data Development Fund, a non-budget state financial fund capitalised at VND 1 trillion (approx. USD 38.3 million). The fund, administered by the Ministry of Public Security, provides subsidised loans, interest-payment support, and grants — delegated through state-owned commercial and policy banks — to develop and protect data infrastructure and to support AI, big data, cloud computing, blockchain, and IoT projects serving state management and digital-transformation goals, with priority for rural and disadvantaged regions. The decree took effect 1 July 2025.

Shenzhen (Guangdong Province) established the Shenzhen Semiconductor and Integrated Circuit Industry Investment Fund (深圳市半导体与集成电路 产业投资基金, "Saimi Industrial Private Fund" / 赛米产业私募基金) with a total scale of CNY 5 billion. The fund completed business registration around 13 May 2025 following establishment on 29 April 2025, and was formally unveiled at a public ceremony on 16 October 2025. It is co-managed by Futian Hongshi (a wholly-owned subsidiary of Shenzhen Capital Group, 深创投) and Zhongzhi Investment Capital (a wholly-owned subsidiary of Shenzhen Major Industry Investment Group, 深重投), and operates under Shenzhen's "20+8" strategic-industry fund framework. It targets general/specialised computing chips, new-architecture storage, optoelectronic/sensor chips, and critical manufacturing equipment, components, materials, and advanced packaging/testing.

On 30 April 2025 the General Office of the Guangdong Provincial People's Government issued Yue Fu Ban [2025] No. 11, "Several Measures of Guangdong Province to Further Stimulate Market Entity Vitality and Accelerate the Construction of a Modern Industrial System," effective immediately through 31 December 2027. The package subsidizes bank-loan interest for manufacturing and high-tech enterprises at up to 35% of the loan rate, capped at RMB 2 billion in total annual subsidy volume and RMB 20 million per enterprise per year, alongside an expansion of government-backed financing-guarantee coverage to over RMB 10 billion annually. It also funds foreign-invested R&D centers (up to RMB 1 million, or RMB 5 million for multinational global R&D centers) and offers headquarters-relocation bonuses of up to RMB 8 million, with priority given to semiconductors, AI, robotics, biotechnology, quantum technology, commercial aerospace, and new-energy vehicles.

On 9 April 2025 the European Commission adopted Communication COM(2025)165, the AI Continent Action Plan, setting out a five-pillar strategy to make the EU a global AI leader. The pillars are (1) computing infrastructure, (2) data for AI, (3) strategic AI innovation and adoption, (4) AI skills and talent, and (5) regulatory simplification. Headline commitments include mobilising approximately €200bn of public+private investment via the InvestAI initiative announced at the AI Action Summit in Paris (11 February 2025), deploying 13 AI Factories (HPC-anchored shared compute facilities) plus regional antennas, building 5 AI Gigafactories powered by >100,000 advanced AI processors with €20bn earmarked from InvestAI, launching the Apply AI Strategy and Data Union Strategy, and proposing a Cloud and AI Development Act with a public consultation closing 4 June 2025. The one-year progress report (9 April 2026) confirmed 19 AI Factories deployed across EU supercomputers with 13 Antennas providing regional access, and €1bn in Apply AI funding calls earmarked.

On 19 February 2025 Vietnam's 15th National Assembly adopted Resolution 193/2025/QH15 at its 9th Extraordinary Session, establishing 12 pilot policy categories that operationalise the Politburo's December 2024 Resolution 57-NQ/TW without requiring full-statute enactment. The resolution's most structurally novel element is an R&D risk-acceptance framework — the first in Southeast Asia — that exempts organisations and individuals from civil liability for damage caused to the State in the course of state-funded R&D activities conducted in compliance with prescribed procedures, directly addressing Vietnam's long-standing chilling effect on state-sector innovation. Additional pilots cover expedited procurement for sci-tech and digital-transformation projects, special tax and immigration incentives for high-skilled AI/semiconductor/ quantum R&D personnel, accelerated permitting pathways for priority-sector R&D investments, a start-up grant and venture framework, and an open-data regime for state-held datasets. Implementing Decree 88/2025/ND-CP was issued shortly after adoption; the resolution provides the legal-framework architecture that complements the financial-instrument side (Decree 182/2024/ND-CP, VND 30 trillion Investment Support Fund) and the sectoral-law cluster enacted in late 2025.

South Korea's Ministry of Science and ICT (MSIT) committed in its 2025 Work Plan to establish a National AI Computing Center via public-private partnership (PPP), with an anchor envelope of KRW 2 trillion rising to KRW 4 trillion through 2030. In July 2025 MSIT executed the first major tranche: KRW 1.46 trillion (approx. USD 1.1 billion) to procure approximately 13,000 high-performance GPUs (NVIDIA B200 and H200) distributed across three domestic cloud operators — Naver Cloud, NHN Cloud, and Kakao. This is Korea's first PPP-structured sovereign-AI compute procurement instrument, structurally distinct from the AI Basic Act (horizontal regulatory framework) and the Semiconductor Special Act (fab investment incentives), as it directly addresses the compute- infrastructure supply constraint for AI model training and national AI research.

The UK government published the AI Opportunities Action Plan (CP 1241) on 13 January 2025, authored by Matt Clifford CBE (Chair, ARIA), and simultaneously accepted all 50 recommendations via the government response (CP 1242). The plan establishes binding cross-government commitments including a 20× expansion of UK sovereign AI compute capacity by 2030, designation of AI Growth Zones (Culham, Oxfordshire named first), a National Data Library, and energy-grid prioritisation for AI datacentres. It positions AI compute as critical national infrastructure and represents the most comprehensive national AI industrial-policy roadmap published in the UK to date.