The impact of Artificial Intelligence hinges on collaboration between businesses, universities and NGOs to jointly evaluate “data and information more quickly and achieve their objectives,” said Anna N. Schlegel, Vice President of Product, International Markets and Globalisation at ProCore Technologies, in her opening talk at the AI & Big Data Congress today. In her view “partnerships built on the data found most quickly and the teams that provide the most credible information will come out on top.”
Schlegel, recognised as the world’s most influential woman in technology by Analytics Insight magazine, said that data “are a corporate gold mine because they help you figure out where to go and where to invest” and that all departments need them. This means “AI is the only way to fast-track your insights.”
“Whoever can build these agile data teams, whoever can get automated access, will be able to make the best decisions, get to market faster, collaborate on global patents and solve problems more easily,” she argued.
Rolling out data analytics and Artificial Intelligence “is a lever for enhancing performance by changing the way specific processes are carried out,” added Congress director Joan Mas, also the director of the Centre of Innovation for Data tech and Artificial Intelligence (CIDAI), which is organising the event, and the Eurecat technology centre’s Digital Division. “It additionally enables businesses to predict future scenarios and thus anticipate specific challenges or problems.”
“Catalonia has the capabilities to spearhead AI development and uptake in Europe and is becoming a global technology hub in artificial intelligence,” commented Daniel Marco, Director General for Innovation and the Digital Economy in the Government of Catalonia. “We have a robust ecosystem of universities, innovation centres and specialised businesses which is growing year after year, attracting international investment and generating a significant economic impact on the country.”
“We need to leverage AI and big data’s potential to drive proactive government when it comes to delivering public services and engaging with the public,” argued Michael Donaldson, Chief Technology Officer and CIO at Barcelona City Council. “However, we will also have to factor in the ethical dimension, non-discrimination and privacy and digital rights safeguards.”
“We are at a time when Artificial Intelligence is starting to be useful for business processes and it is not only large firms which are seeing results,” said Xavier Torra, chair of Eurecat. “Small and medium-sized enterprises are also hardwiring Artificial Intelligence into their production processes and reaping a very significant return in terms of competitiveness.”
Ethics and talent in Artificial Intelligence
The first day of the AI & Big Data Congress looked at the ethical principles involved when companies and organisations deploy Artificial Intelligence solutions and also at AI and its potential for identifying solutions for the common good. The session was moderated by Karina Gibert, Director of the Intelligent Data Science and Artificial Intelligence Research Centre at IDEAl-UPC, and featured Michael Donaldson, Chief Technology Officer and CIO at Barcelona City Council; Albert Sabater, Director of the Observatory of Ethics in Artificial Intelligence of Catalonia (OEIAC); Ricardo Baeza-Yates, Research Director at the Institute for Experiential AI at Northeastern University, and Montse Pardo, Government Affairs Director, Corporate, External and Legal Affairs (CELA) at Microsoft Ibérica.
The congress also hosted a presentation exploring strategies for attracting and retaining talent in Artificial Intelligence. The speakers were Xavi Escales, founder of AlwaysPeopleFirst Technologies, Mariona Cíller, co-founder and co-director of SokoTech, and Javier Campelo, Head of Analytics and AI Solution Leader at Aggity. It was introduced by Daniel Santanach, Coordinator of the AI Strategy of Catalonia (Catalonia.AI) in the Catalan Government’s Ministry of the Vice-Presidency and Digital Policies and Territory.
In health and wellbeing, experts from the TIC Salut Social Foundation, the SDG Group, everis, an NTT DATA Company, the Computer Vision Centre, AlGecko Technologies and Barcelona City Council shared several examples of successful proofs of concept from the sector standpoint. One of them is the Artificial Intelligence-based tool presented by Jordi Escayola, Advanced Analytics manager at the SDG Group, which uses a smartphone camera to generate indicators of the overall state of health and wellbeing of people and also provide information to health centres which have patients using this device for GDPR compliance.
CIDAI is a public-private partnership coming under the Catalan Government’s Catalonia.AI strategy and is coordinated by Eurecat. It involves the Catalan Government’s Ministry of the Vice-Presidency and Digital Policies and Territory; Barcelona City Council; the Barcelona Supercomputing Center; the Computer Vision Centre; everis, an NTT DATA Company; the i2CAT Foundation; Microsoft; the SDG Group; the Intelligent Data Science and Artificial Intelligence Research Center (IDEAI) at the Polytechnic University of Catalonia · BarcelonaTech (UPC) and Eurecat.
CIDAI supports generating, validating and transferring reliable Artificial Intelligence technologies with high added value to foster technology uptake and innovation in the country’s strategic sectors and its businesses and institutions as well as sharing these technologies and best practices with society at large.
The AI & Big Data Congress is an event organised by CIDAI and coordinated by Eurecat. It is sponsored by the Government of Catalonia, Barcelona City Council, the SDG Group, Microsoft, everis, an NTT DATA Company, and CaixaBank.
