BRUSSELS, July 4 (Reuters) - The European Union's

landmark rules on artificial intelligence will be rolled out

according to the legal timeline in the legislation, the European

Commission said on Friday, dismissing calls from some companies

and countries for a pause.

Google owner Alphabet, Facebook owner Meta

and other U.S. companies as well as European businesses

such as Mistral and ASML have in recent days urged the

Commission to delay the AI Act by years.

"I've seen, indeed, a lot of reporting, a lot of letters and

a lot of things being said on the AI Act. Let me be as clear as

possible, there is no stop the clock. There is no grace period.

There is no pause," Commission spokesperson Thomas Regnier told

a press conference.

"We have legal deadlines established in a legal text. The

provisions kicked in February, general purpose AI model

obligations will begin in August, and next year, we have the

obligations for high risk models that will kick in in August

2026," he said.

The Commission plans to propose steps to simplify its

digital rules towards the end of the year, such as cutting back

on reporting obligations for small companies.

Some companies have voiced concerns about the compliance

costs and tough requirements of the AI rules, which aim to set

guardrails on a technology key to multiple sectors of the

economy and currently led by the United States and China.