Erich is a Researcher on the compute policy team at IAPS, where his work focuses on the AI chip export controls and AI data center security. He previously worked as a programmer and earned a BSc in Computer Engineering and an MSc in Interaction Design from Chalmers University of Technology.
AI systems are advancing at breakneck speed and already reshaping markets, geopolitics, and the priorities of governments. Frontier AI systems are developed and deployed using compute clusters of hundreds of thousands of cutting-edge AI chips housed in specialized data centers. These AI data centers are likely tempting targets for sophisticated adversaries like China and Russia, who may seek to steal intellectual property or sabotage AI systems underpinning military, industry, or critical infrastructure projects.
Adapted from a section of a report by Erich Grunewald and Christopher Phenicie, this blog post introduces the core concepts and background information needed to understand the AI chip-making process.
Computational power (“compute”) is a strategic resource in the way that oil and steel production capacity were in the past. Like oil, and like steel production capacity, compute is scarce, controllable, concentrated, and highly economically and militarily useful. Just as oil and steel were and remain strategic resources to some extent, compute is now also a strategic resource of very high importance.
