Last week, Vultr participated in the 2025 RAISE Summit, an extraordinary gathering of global AI leaders hosted in the heart of Paris. Set beneath the glass pyramid of the Carrousel du Louvre, the summit was a celebration of innovation, policy, and real-world AI impact. For Vultr, the location was especially meaningful: Paris is not only home to one of our 32 cloud data center regions, but also a key market where data sovereignty, compliance, and cloud independence matter deeply.
From the packed keynotes to the hands-on workshops, RAISE delivered on its promise to spark dialogue and showcase progress in artificial intelligence. And for Vultr, it was a chance to demonstrate how our AI-native infrastructure is helping organizations build, scale, and deploy next-generation applications faster.
Hackathon highlights: Agentic AI in action
One of the most exciting parts of the week was sponsoring the agentic AI hackathon, organized by our partner lablab.ai. With over 100 participating teams and more than 50 Vultr-powered submissions, our track was the most popular of the summit. The engagement, creativity, and engineering talent on display were exceptional.
The first-place winner, Unmask, developed an AI solution to help hiring teams verify resumes, identities, and interview data, enabling smarter and faster hiring decisions.
Second place went to Onboard-Me, which transforms internal documents into adaptive, AI-powered onboarding experiences to help new employees ramp up more efficiently.
Two teams tied for third place. Axiom Prime created an AI-powered platform to monitor infrastructure and diagnose issues automatically, while Ringy transcribes and processes customer support calls in real time using Groq-powered AI on Vultr’s infrastructure.
The runner-up, Office Brainstorm, built a simulation tool that models collaborative workplace challenges, using AI to enhance team discussions and decision-making.
It was inspiring to see so many developers build real, production-ready agentic AI applications in just a few days, all leveraging Vultr’s global infrastructure and GPU-accelerated performance.
Vultr’s vision: On stage with theCUBE
During the summit, our CMO Kevin Cochrane joined theCUBE’s John Furrier for a wide-ranging conversation on Vultr’s AI-first growth journey.
In the interview, Cochrane shared how Vultr became the world’s largest independent cloud platform with no outside capital, no sales team, and a model that reduces cloud spend by up to 90%. The discussion explored Vultr’s next wave of innovation — from composable AI infrastructure and pre-built Terraform templates to a developer-centric model that accelerates the shift from proof-of-concept to production.
Cochrane also emphasized the rising importance of sovereign cloud infrastructure, especially in Europe. With governments and enterprises facing stricter compliance and data residency mandates, Vultr’s presence in Paris and across Europe is more relevant than ever.
Watch the full interview here.
Booth highlights: Customer and partner-driven innovation
Throughout the summit, Vultr’s booth was a hub of activity, packed with in-theater sessions, live demos, and meaningful conversations with AI builders from around the world. We were proud to be joined by several of our key partners who are helping drive the next wave of AI-native innovation.
Koyeb, a France-based leader in serverless deployment, took the stage to showcase how their platform integrates seamlessly with Vultr’s global cloud infrastructure. Together, we demonstrated how AI workloads can be deployed across CPUs and GPUs without the need for complex orchestration or infrastructure management.
We were also joined by NetApp, IPA Therapeutics, Lablup, Clarifai, Console Connect, Confidential Mind, and others. Each brought unique expertise and insights to the conversation, reinforcing the power of a vibrant, open ecosystem. Across every presentation, the message was clear: AI innovation happens faster when partners collaborate on infrastructure, tools, and services that are purpose-built for speed, scalability, and compliance.
Looking ahead
RAISE Summit 2025 affirmed what we already know: the future of AI is global, sovereign, and built on open infrastructure. Vultr is proud to play a leading role in that transformation, not just by offering top-tier GPUs and compute resources, but by supporting the builders, researchers, and innovators shaping tomorrow’s breakthroughs.