Event round-up | AI Adoption in the UK: Putting AI into Action
Click here to read the 'AI Adoption in the UK: Putting AI into Action' Report
The event celebrated the immense progress that the UK has made in its AI adoption journey through a variety of lightning talks from techUK members to present some of the fascinating case studies in the report.
We also had a fireside chat with Dame Wendy Hall on the topic of ‘AI-readiness’ in the UK and a panel session to discuss how industry and government can collaborate effectively to promote AI adoption.
Below you can watch the recordings of each session and learn more!
Fireside Chat with Professor Dame Wendy Hall: Is the UK AI-Ready?
In conversation with Sue Daley; techUK’s Director for Tech & Innovation, Dame Wendy Hall shared some of her reflections about how she sees AI adoption progressing in the UK, public trust and how we can practically embed ethical principles. She also spoke about the importance of diversity in the workforce to shape AI that is ethical. As a final message, Wendy encouraged greater investment to go into AI education in schools.
AI Use Case Lightning Talks
We then learnt about the different ways in which AI is being put into action across a number of sectors, through a variety of lightning talks delivered by techUK members. The speakers delved into some of the case studies that have been included in the report, sharing their first-hand experiences and how their applications have had a lasting impact. You can read the full case studies as well as many others in our report!
Wayve’s ‘AV2.0’ pioneers a new approach to self-driving using AI and data – Daniel Quirke, Technical Policy Manager, Wayve
KPMG use AI to understand and improve A&E waiting times and support operational decision making – Dr Tao Guo, Director of Data Science & AI, KPMG
Trilateral Research provides Ethical AI solutions to tackle complex social problems and benefit humanity – Dr Filippo Marchetti, Head of Strategic Impact, Trilateral Research
AVEVA worked with ENEL Green Power to produce AI-powered predictive analytics for performance optimisation – Dr David Smith, Senior Analytical Solutions Engineer, AVEVA
Hazy’s synthetic data helps enterprises unlock their data to enable safe and fast innovation – Gareth Rees, VP of Customer, Hazy
The Benevolent PlatformTM augments scientific ingenuity with AI to navigate an ever-expanding data landscape to map complex diseases – Dr Nicola Richmond, VP of AI, BenevolentAI
Panel session: How can industry and Government collaborate effectively to promote AI adoption?
This session was chaired by Katherine Holden, Head of Data Analytics, AI and Digital ID at techUK. Panellists included Sam Cannicott, Deputy Director for AI & Digital Regulation Policy at the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology; Sara El-Hanfy, Head of AI and Machine Learning at Innovate UK; Dr Gilbert Owusu, Data and AI Director at BT; and, Laura Taddei, Director of Business Affairs, BenevolentAI.
The panellists reflected on the UK’s AI adoption journey, its benefits and what we need to prioritise moving forward. Sam Cannicott highlighted the work that the government has been doing to promote AI growth, such the package announced in the Spring Budget 2023 and the highly anticipated AI regulation white paper which has now been released. Sara El-Hanfy spoke about how AI adoption is lagging behind where it should be in some sectors and introduced the BridgeAI project which aims to address barriers in high-growth sectors.
In reflecting on BT’s own AI journey, Dr Gilbert Owusu said that we need to understand the objectives of organisations in order to incentivise collaboration. Laura Taddei underlined that “more data means more innovation”, and that this is a key area in which government and industry can work together to create more impact.
On another note – you can get involved in our AI Week, please see details below!
Get involved with techUK’s AI Week 2023
techUK's annual AI Campaign Week is back and taking place from 17 April to 21 April. Throughout the week we will be highlighting the latest cutting-edge developments in AI across healthcare and life sciences, environment and sustainability, assisted intelligence, financial services, and transport and infrastructure. We encourage all our members to submit blogs, case studies, videos and other content that you’d like to share on the relevant themes. If you would like to make a submission, please send it to Carmine Greusard-Deffeuille – [email protected] by Friday 7 April (can be a bit flexible if you're short on time).