The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) has partnered with the DFINITY Foundation on a programme exploring sovereign cloud infrastructure and agentic AI for public services.
Under the agreement, DFINITY will work with UNDP over the next 12 months to pilot the technology across selected UNDP Country Offices and civil society organisations, while also working with governments on co-designed projects.
The partnership comes as governments and public institutions face growing questions around data control, infrastructure dependence and the use of AI in services involving sensitive information. Axios reported that the pilot is intended to help governments develop AI-powered applications with less reliance on major US-based cloud providers, while giving them greater control over where data and infrastructure are managed.
UNDP works in more than 170 countries and has supported the development of digital public infrastructure in more than 25 countries, according to the partnership announcement.
DFINITY will provide its Cloud Engines technology for the pilots, with the OpenSaaS software suite built in. The setup is intended to give participating organisations the ability to develop custom applications using a range of AI development tools, including Caffeine, Claude Code, Codex and Perplexity.
DFINITY describes the Internet Computer as a cloud platform designed to host applications and AI agents, with its current developer offering supporting tools including Caffeine as well as integrations for AI coding agents such as Claude and Codex.
For governments, the focus on sovereignty is particularly relevant as public agencies increasingly assess how AI systems handle government data and where computing infrastructure is located. The Axios report said UNDP and DFINITY will assess pilot projects based on factors including cost, usability and potential to scale.
The pilots will give UNDP and participating governments an opportunity to test whether the technology can meet practical public-sector requirements rather than relying solely on technical demonstrations.
The partnership also fits with DFINITY’s broader push into sovereign cloud services. The foundation currently promotes infrastructure designed to keep data, application logic and AI workloads within a jurisdiction-controlled environment, with governments and enterprises identified as key users.
The next 12 months will therefore be an important testing period for the partnership. The outcome will depend on how the technology performs in real public-service settings, including its cost, usability, scalability and ability to meet the operational requirements of government and civil society organisations.
For UNDP, the programme provides another avenue for testing emerging technology in countries where digital infrastructure and public services are being developed. For DFINITY, it offers an opportunity to demonstrate its sovereign cloud and AI capabilities in settings where control over data and infrastructure is a central consideration.
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