Austria urges EU to host Anthropic after US AI export restrictions

Austria’s State Secretary for Digitalisation, Alexander Proell (Pröll), sent a letter to EU Technology Commissioner Henna Virkkunen urging the bloc to explore a “strategic establishment and participation” of the U.S. AI firm Anthropic within the European Union. The proposal comes after a U.S. Commerce Department export‑control directive forced Anthropic to shut down its two most advanced models, Mythos 5 and Fable 5, for all non‑U.S. users. Austria argues that Europe must secure legal certainty, market access, capital and shared values for Anthropic to avoid being cut off from frontier AI, and to reduce dependence on U.S. and Chinese technology. The appeal aligns with the EU’s recent AI‑sovereignty package, including the AI Act and initiatives on chips, cloud and semiconductor supply chains. While the U.S. later partially lifted the ban for a limited set of firms, access to Fable 5 remains blocked. Anthropic has not commented on the Austrian initiative. Proell wrote, “The real question is not whether it is easy. The question is whether we Europeans are prepared to be the architects of our technological future, or whether we wish to remain mere administrators of decisions made elsewhere.”