by Catelijne Muller, President of the EESC Thematic Study Group on AI and Member of the AI HLG

On 18 June, I had the great pleasure of opening the ‘AI Europe | Stakeholder Summit’ organised by the European Commission and the European Economic and Social Committee (EESC) in Brussels. It was a very successful event thanks to the excellent speakers and panellists, the wonderful moderator and last but not least the participants themselves.

The event attracted 200 European stakeholders, EU policymakers and experts from various fields (computer science, ethics, philosophy, economics, law, labour, standardisation) who gathered for the first stakeholder summit, agreed that artificial intelligence holds great promises in addressing societal issues, but also raises a number of challenges around privacy, security, labour, education and ethics.

Mariya Gabriel, EU Commissioner for the Digital Economy and Society, also attended the event, and gave a key note speech on the Commission's efforts to start a coordinated action on artificial intelligence. I agree with her that Europe needs to be a leader in this new era of technological change.

Eric Horvitz, Head of Microsoft Research Labs, who also gave a keynote speech, stressed both the technical capabilities of AI as well as the need to address the ethical and societal implications.

The plenary session included several teaser speeches on mobilising Europe around the EU strategy on AI. Two of them were by two other members of the newly-appointed High-Level Expert Group on Artificial Intelligence: Aimee van Wynsberghe, Assistant Professor of Ethics and Robotics at TUDelft, and Thiébaut Weber, Confederal Secretary at ETUC. Sara Conejo Cervantes, from Teens in AI, also delivered a very inspiring speech.

At the heart of the summit were three parallel working groups on the pillars of the EU strategy on artificial intelligence: industrial competitiveness of AI, socio-economic impact of AI, and ethics of AI. Participants stressed the importance of new forms of education, which not only should allow people to understand artificial intelligence better, but also prepare them to adapt to a changing labour market.

The issue of cohesion was brought up as well, emphasising the need to make sure that all regions and Member States benefit from artificial intelligence equally. Finally, participants addressed the issue of human rights and consumer protection, noting that citizens should remain the focus of discussion.

I invite all the members of the European AI Alliance to visit the website of the ‘AI Europe | Stakeholder Summit’ event, where you can find out more about the programme of the day, the issues addressed by the working groups, and the presentations given by the speakers.