How will AI and tech sovereignty evolve globally between now and 2030?
Forrester’s research measures several countries’ ability to develop, operate and secure critical technologies independently of a foreign governments’ influence.
Forrester has published the findings of its new ‘Global Sovereignty Forecast, 2025 to 2030’ report, which takes a look at how AI and technology sovereignty is likely to evolve across 14 major global economies between now and 2030.
The study measured countries’ ability to develop, operate and secure critical technologies independently of foreign governments’ influence.
What was discovered is that despite significant investment in sovereign AI, chip manufacturing, cloud infrastructure and national technology capabilities, it is projected that global tech sovereignty will advance slowly over the next few years, with China and the US maintaining a lead position.
The average tech sovereignty score across all 14 countries assessed – which were Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Italy, Japan, Mexico, South Korea, Spain, the UK and the US – predicts only a minimal rise from 39pc in 2025 to 40pc in 2030.
Each country was analysed across nine dimensions of technology sovereignty: government AI investment; cloud sovereignty; technology workforce availability; AI model development; data centre capacity relative to technology spending; data centre autonomy; semiconductor production; software creation; and rare earths processing.
With China and the US recording the highest overall tech sovereignty scores at 82pc and 79pc respectively, the report suggests that tech sovereignty will remain concentrated among a small number of geopolitical and economic powers. If other regions are serious about closing capability gaps and reducing tech dependencies, they will need to commit to strategic partnerships and alliances.
Key highlights
Perhaps unsurprisingly given the recent worldwide focus, across all technology dimensions, semiconductor manufacturing was found to have the strongest projected improvement. The US’s and South Korea’s chip production scores are set to increase from 45pc in 2025 to 79pc in 2030. Meanwhile, Japan is expected to jump from 36pc to 53pc, China from 40pc to 51pc and India from 0pc to 13pc.
However, the report also noted that even amid the improvements, semiconductors and software will remain among the most significant sovereignty challenges due to concentrated chip supply chains and a handful of dominant software providers.
Sovereignty was also divided in terms of which country in North America you belong to. While the US is forecast to remain a global leader, Canada is expected to improve modestly, going from 33pc to 34pc. Mexico will continue to remain the lowest among the 14 countries assessed at 20pc, highlighting the region’s uneven distribution of technology power.
It was also noted that Europe’s largest economies are likely to remain overly dependent on resources from foreign technology providers. Sovereignty scores in Germany and Spain will only rise by two percentage points from 34pc in 2025 to 36pc in 2030, France will rise from 33pc to 35pc, the UK from 30pc to 32pc and Italy from 27pc to 29pc.
“Despite these improvements, Europe’s lower scores reflect significant dependencies on chips, cloud, software and data centre capacity,” said the report.
Commenting on the report, Dario Maisto, a principal analyst at Forrester said: “Ongoing geopolitical volatility, AI competition and semiconductor supply chain risks have put tech sovereignty firmly in the spotlight.
“Today, tech sovereignty is concentrated in the hands of a few global leaders, creating an uneven competitive advantage for some countries. To compete in the AI era, nations must understand their strategic dependencies and build durable partnerships that safeguard their data, infrastructure and long-term autonomy.”
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