Canada, Decentralization, DePIN

Canada has long been at the forefront of raising talent and establishing solid institutes for artificial intelligence research. Boasting world-class research institutions and renowned AI pioneers such as Geoffrey Hinton and Yoshua Bengio, the country has established itself as a fertile ground for AI innovation. Despite this impressive reputation — and ranking in the top 10 in the Tortoise Global AI Index — the country is grappling with a critical shortage of domestic computing power, or "compute."

Canadian researchers and companies frequently find themselves reliant on foreign resources, primarily from the United States. This dependence has been the focus of significant concerns regarding data sovereignty, national security and compliance with Canadian privacy regulations.

The issue with the compute infrastructure highlights a strategic vulnerability: Recent reports indicate that Canada's high-performance computing infrastructure is severely lagging behind other G7 nations. When adjusted for population and economic differences, the US has between 8 and 11 times Canada's AI compute capabilities, while Japan leads by roughly eight times, and European countries like France and Germany surpass Canada by two to three times.

Even Quebec's Narval supercomputer, once the nation's leading computing resource, has dropped sharply in global rankings, underscoring an urgent need for robust domestic infrastructure.

Decentralized networks emerge as a solution

As Canada struggles to establish a high-performance computing infrastructure, global tech trends emerge in the AI-savvy country’s favor. The first is the rise of decentralized physical infrastructure networks (DePIN), which leverages user-contributed networks to distribute computing power to significantly reduce reliance on centralized cloud providers.

The second critical trend involves open-weight AI models, such as LLaMA, Qwen and DeepSeek. These models are gaining popularity because they require high-performance yet cost-effective decentralized back-end infrastructure to support training and inference.

Recognizing these developments, Canadian innovators have already started harnessing these trends to create an innovative solution specifically tailored to the country's unique needs.

Canada’s sovereign AI cloud is decentralized

Nebula Block, a spin-out of the Montreal-based AI company Nebula AI, is building what Canada has long needed but never had: a truly sovereign, AI-first cloud platform purpose-built to empower Canadian researchers, startups and enterprises developing next-generation intelligent systems.

Addressing Canada’s AI compute shortfall, Nebula Block provides affordable, high-performance GPU infrastructure, offering capabilities at significantly lower costs — between 50% and 80% less expensive than major cloud providers — without compromising performance. The decentralized platform utilizes cutting-edge hardware, including RTX 5090, A100 and H100 GPUs, optimized for AI training and inference workloads.

Nebula Block emphasizes openness and flexibility. It offers fully customizable computing environments preloaded with critical AI frameworks like PyTorch, HuggingFace, FlashAttention and FSDP, along with full SSH access, enabling compatibility with all leading open-source AI models. Its strategic partnerships further enhance decentralized computing capabilities and integration with popular open-weight models.

Comprehensive AI cloud services

Nebula Block provides a robust suite of services tailored specifically for AI workloads:

  • Serverless endpoints: Instant access to generative models like Meta LLaMA and DeepSeek via managed APIs, with effortless scaling.

  • Dedicated endpoints: Reserved GPU-powered infrastructure for fine-tuning custom models or critical real-time inference tasks.

  • On-demand GPU instances: Flexible, rapid deployment of top-tier Nvidia GPUs (B200, H200, H100, A100, L40S, RTX 5090 or 4090) billed by usage, suitable for large-scale AI projects.

  • S3-compatible object storage: Secure and scalable storage solution for data sets and model management, seamlessly integrated with computing services.

Source: Nebula Block

Real-world impact

Nebula Block’s effectiveness was demonstrated when an AI-driven communications technology company faced critical delays due to infrastructure issues with its primary cloud provider. The company's cloud provider was unable to promptly address an urgent infrastructure failure, threatening a significant project delivery.

Leveraging Nebula Block’s intelligent workload orchestration tool, the team quickly identified and secured an available H200 GPU node from its global infrastructure network. Within minutes, the workload was seamlessly shifted to the alternative infrastructure, allowing the project to continue without interruption.

The client was able to meet their deadline comfortably, completing in just three days a task originally anticipated to take weeks. Ultimately, the workload was smoothly transitioned back to the primary infrastructure once it was restored, highlighting Nebula Block’s unique ability to ensure operational resilience and business continuity under challenging conditions.

Strengthening Canada's AI sovereignty

Nebula Block aligns closely with Canada’s Pan-Canadian AI Strategy and guidelines from the Competition Bureau, which emphasize independence from global cloud giants. Fully Canadian-managed, Nebula Block meets stringent national data security standards, making it suitable for sensitive sectors like healthcare, finance and government.

Nebula Block actively supports and enhances Canada's AI community through targeted initiatives:

  • Academic partnerships: Collaborations with top institutions like the University of Montreal, McGill and Concordia, offering grants, workshops and research opportunities to develop Canadian AI talent.

  • Startup support: Customized credit programs, mentoring and specialized infrastructure designed to nurture and retain Canadian AI startups.

  • Enterprise solutions: Compliant, Canadian-managed infrastructure solutions tailored for regulated industries such as finance, healthcare and government, providing a secure domestic alternative to US hyperscale clouds.

The Nebula Block team envisions an AI infrastructure as open and decentralized as Web3 itself. One that can fuel the next wave of AI-powered decentralized applications (DApps), agents and protocols. Through its comprehensive suite of AI infrastructure services and commitment to national technological sovereignty, Nebula Block aims to build the foundation for the next chapter of Canadian leadership in artificial intelligence.

Learn more about Nebula Block

Disclaimer. Cointelegraph does not endorse any content or product on this page. While we aim at providing you with all important information that we could obtain in this sponsored article, readers should do their own research before taking any actions related to the company and carry full responsibility for their decisions, nor can this article be considered as investment advice.