French President Emmanuel Macron wants Europe to be a leader in artificial intelligence (AI), telling a global summit of AI and political leaders in Paris that France’s private sector has invested nearly $113 billion in AI development in France.
In a speech at the Grand Palais in Paris, Macron stressed that financial investment is key to making Europe a hub for AI.
He said the European Union also needs to “adopt the Notre Dame strategy,” a term referring to France’s rapid reconstruction of the cathedral in five years after a 2019 fire by simplifying regulations and sticking to a strict timetable.
“We showed the world that when we commit to a clear timeline, we deliver,” President Macron said.
The EU is in favor of simplifying regulations, said Henna Virkkunen, the EU’s digital chief. The EU passed the AI Act last year, the world’s first broad set of rules aimed at regulating technology.
European countries want to ensure they have a seat at the table in the technology race to face stiff competition from the United States and other emerging challengers. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen is due to speak on Tuesday about the EU’s competitiveness in the technology sector.
Macron’s announcement of large-scale French private sector investments in AI was “reassuring” to Clem Delangue, CEO of Hugging Face, a US company with a French co-founder working on open source AI, who said it meant “ambitious” projects for France, according to Reuters.
Google CEO Sundar Pichai told the conference that the move to AI will be “the biggest change in our lifetimes.”
However, the massive shift also raises questions for the AI community. France wants the summit to adopt a non-binding statement declaring that AI should be inclusive and sustainable.
“We have the opportunity to democratize access (to a new technology) from the very beginning,” Pichai said at the summit.
However, it remains uncertain whether the US will agree to the proposal, given recent steps by the US government to try to dismantle the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) initiative.
U.S. Vice President JD Vance will attend the summit and is expected to speak on Tuesday. Other politicians expected to attend the plenary session on Tuesday include Chinese Vice Premier Zhang Guoqing and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. A total of about 100 politicians are expected to attend.
With the shift to artificial intelligence, other issues also need to be considered. The World Trade Organization (WTO) said that according to its calculations, “near-universal adoption of artificial intelligence… could increase trade by up to 14 percentage points”, but also warned that “fragmented” regulations on global AI technology and data flows could lead to a contraction in trade and output.
One worrying side effect of AI technology is that it could replace the need for human labor in some industries.
Gilbert Houngbo, head of the International Labor Organization, said at the summit on Monday that most of the jobs that AI could replace, such as clerical work, are done by women. Based on current statistics, this situation could widen the gender pay gap.