Spanish companies need to invest in talent to maximise benefits of AI

Companies around the world are rushing to embrace new artificial intelligence technologies, and the situation is no different in Spain.

But Spanish companies need to tackle a number of challenges, including a lack of skilled talent to develop and implement the new technology, to maximise its potential, and to mitigate the risks that it creates.

This warning was made by Amparo Alonso Betanzos, an AI expert from the La Coruña University, during the recent annual conference of Spanish risk management association IGREA, in Málaga.

But she also stressed that Spain has given an important step ahead in the handling of AI risks by pioneering the creation of a supervisory body to monitor the implementation of the technology in the country.

The Spanish Agency for the Supervision of Artificial Intelligence, which will be hosted in La Coruña, in Northwestern Spain, will have a strong focus on the ethics of AI, Alonso said.

Discussions about the ethics of artificial intelligence have been boosted by the success of generative AI technologies such as ChatGPT, which enables the creation of images, audios, texts or videos that can have severe consequences for companies.

Alonso noted that too much reliance on AI tools that can generate content from scratch can be a risky proposition, as apps often present gender, racial or ideological biases, inherited from their creators or the content they work with, that may be difficult to spot.

This is a problem already observed in texts created by chatbots and in facial and voice recognition systems that are becoming ever more commonly used by companies and governments.

Dealing with such risks will require an ever more specialized workforce, she pointed out. That means not only hiring workers with a knowledge of new technologies, but also training other professionals to make use of the tools that will be developed with them.

“In Spain, we have a problem. The kind of education we are providing is not just outdated, it goes well beyond that,” she said. “Spain is among the European countries with the lowest ratio of graduates in fields like sciences, technology, engineering and mathematics.”

Finding the right talent is also of essence because AI will create some thorny new challenges for their users. Alonso mentioned developments such as the liability of self-driving cars and the emergence of neurorights legislation as the threats of risks that will enter the radar of risk managers as time goes on.

She also noted that generative AI technologies such as ChatGPT issue immense amounts of carbon emissions that may go against the environmental pledges made by companies.

Furthermore, Alonso stressed that regulation is necessary and will come, and Europe is taking the lead in its development.

In fact, a day after her speech, the European Parliament approved the first draft of the EU Artificial Intelligence Act, the world’s first piece of legislation that aims to regulate the use of AI by companies.

“Regulation will work, but it will take time,” she said. “And (big tech) companies have a responsibility for their companies and they need to have an internal code of ethics. If they say that AI is very dangerous and will destroy humanity, then they should turn it off.”