<figure class="wp-block-image size-full"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="929" height="523" src="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/108008818-1721376380367-gettyimages-2162122113-europapress_6090171_spain_national_team_plane_arriving_durin.jpeg" alt="" class="wp-image-509305" srcset="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/108008818-1721376380367-gettyimages-2162122113-europapress_6090171_spain_national_team_plane_arriving_durin.jpeg 929w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/108008818-1721376380367-gettyimages-2162122113-europapress_6090171_spain_national_team_plane_arriving_durin-300x169.jpeg 300w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/108008818-1721376380367-gettyimages-2162122113-europapress_6090171_spain_national_team_plane_arriving_durin-820x462.jpeg 820w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/108008818-1721376380367-gettyimages-2162122113-europapress_6090171_spain_national_team_plane_arriving_durin-160x90.jpeg 160w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/108008818-1721376380367-gettyimages-2162122113-europapress_6090171_spain_national_team_plane_arriving_durin-768x432.jpeg 768w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 929px) 100vw, 929px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Spain National Team plane arriving at Adolfo Suarez Madrid-Barajas airport on July 15, 2024, in Madrid, Spain. Europa Press Sports | Europa Press | Getty Images</figcaption></figure>



July 19 (Reuters) &#8211; A global tech outage that appeared to be related to issues at global cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike and Microsoft was affecting operations in various sectors on Friday including airports, airlines, media and banks.



Below is a list of disruptions that have been reported:



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-airlines-airports">AIRLINES, AIRPORTS</h2>



&#8211; Berlin airport has halted all flights until 10 a.m. (0800 GMT) due to a technical fault, the operator said.



&#8211; Spanish airport operator Aena reported a computer systems &#8220;incident&#8221; at all Spanish airports which may cause flight delays.



&#8211; Amsterdam&#8217;s airport Schiphol, one of the major air transport hubs in Europe, said it was affected by a global cyber outage, and advised travellers to contact their airlines.



&#8211; Top Dutch airline KLM said it could not handle flights on Friday and that it suspended most of its operations. Air France, KLM&#8217;s parent company, said that its operations were disrupted.



&#8211; Turkish Airlines is experiencing problems with ticketing, check-in, and booking due to a global technical issue in its information systems, it said in a post on X.



&#8211; Major U.S. carriers including American Airlines, Delta Airlines and United Airlines issued ground stops on Friday morning citing communication issues.



&#8211; A SAS spokesperson said the Scandinavian airline was expecting delays.



&#8211; Australia&#8217;s national airline Qantas and Sydney airport said planes were delayed but still flying.



&#8211; Passengers at Britain&#8217;s Edinburgh Airport were unable to use automated boarding pass scanners on Friday, and monitors at security displayed a message saying &#8220;server offline&#8221;, a Reuters witness reported.



&#8211; Hong Kong-based airline Cathay Pacific&nbsp;0293.HK&nbsp;said in a note to customers that self-service check in facilities at Hong Kong International Airport were unavailable due to &#8220;unexpected technical issues&#8221;. It advised customers to arrive early or check in online before coming to the airport.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-financials">FINANCIALS</h2>



&#8211; Australia&#8217;s largest bank, Commonwealth Bank, said some customers had been unable to transfer money due to the service outage.



&#8211; Several major oil and gas trading desks in London and Singapore were struggling to execute trades due to a cyber outage on Friday, six industry sources told Reuters.



&#8211; Macquarie Capital was unable to provide liquidity for unexpired warrants on HKEX due to technical problems.



&#8211; South Africa&#8217;s Capitec said card payments, ATM and app services were fully restored following significant nationwide disruptions linked to CrowdStrike.



&#8211; LSEG Group&#8217;s Workspace news and data platform suffered an outage on Friday that affected user access worldwide, causing disruption across financial markets.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-media">MEDIA</h2>



&#8211; Sky News, one of Britain&#8217;s major television news channels, was off air on Friday.



&#8211; Australia&#8217;s state broadcaster ABC said it was experiencing a &#8220;major network outage&#8221;, without giving a reason.



&#8211; Regular programming at Sky News Australia was disrupted.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-emergency-services-healthcare">EMERGENCY SERVICES, HEALTHCARE</h2>



&#8211; A health booking system used by doctors in England is offline, medical officials said on X on Friday.



&#8211; Several hospitals in the Netherlands had to scale down their operations because of the power outage, Dutch press agency ANP reported.



&#8211; Victorian state police in Australia said some internal systems had been hit by the outage but emergency services were operating normally.



&#8211; Copenhagen&#8217;s fire department said on X it was experiencing problems receiving automatically transmitted fire alarms following the outage, and urged people to call 112 in case of a fire.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-other">OTHER</h2>



&#8211; A spokesperson for New Zealand&#8217;s parliament said its computer systems had also been affected.



(Reporting by Reuters bureaus; Compiled by Anna Pruchnicka, Andrey Sychev; Editing by Emelia Sithole-Matarise)

108008818-1721376380367-gettyimages-2162122113-europapress_6090171_spain_national_team_plane_arriving_durin

Global tech outage delays flights and disrupts services around the world

<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="820" height="588" src="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/YDXUHLFUPRP4RNSFLEWADBZOR4-820x588.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-500391" srcset="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/YDXUHLFUPRP4RNSFLEWADBZOR4-820x588.jpg 820w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/YDXUHLFUPRP4RNSFLEWADBZOR4-300x215.jpg 300w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/YDXUHLFUPRP4RNSFLEWADBZOR4-125x90.jpg 125w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/YDXUHLFUPRP4RNSFLEWADBZOR4-768x551.jpg 768w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/YDXUHLFUPRP4RNSFLEWADBZOR4-1536x1102.jpg 1536w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/YDXUHLFUPRP4RNSFLEWADBZOR4-scaled.jpg 2048w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 820px) 100vw, 820px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">FILE PHOTO &#8211; The tower of the headquarters of the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) is seen in Basel, Switzerland March 18, 2021. REUTERS/Arnd Wiegmann</figcaption></figure>



LONDON, June 25 (Reuters)&nbsp;&#8211;&nbsp;Central banks should embrace the benefits of artificial intelligence (AI) the Bank for International Settlements (BIS)has said, but stressed the technology should not replace humans when it comes to setting interest rates.



In its first major report into the rapidly advancing world of AI, the central banking umbrella group said policymakers need to harness its immense power to monitor data in real time in order to &#8220;sharpen&#8221; their inflation-predicting abilities.



That was something found badly wanting in the wake of COVID-19 and Russia&#8217;s invasion of Ukraine when the U.S. Federal Reserve, ECB and other major central banks all failed to grasp the strength of the global inflation surge.



New AI models should reduce the risk of a repeat although their untested nature and the fact they can &#8220;hallucinate&#8221; mean they should not become robo-ratesetters, Cecilia Skingsley, a top official at the BIS, said.



&#8220;We like to hold humans accountable,&#8221; the former Swedish central banker said, referring to the crucial role borrowing costs play in society and the need for judgment.



&#8220;So I can&#8217;t really see a future where an AI will be setting (interest) rates.&#8221;



The BIS, often dubbed the central bankers&#8217; central bank because of the joint work it does, already has eight projects involving AI.



Hyun Song Shin, its head of research and top economic adviser, said policymakers should not view it as &#8220;something magical&#8221; but did say it can help find needles in haystacks and spot vulnerabilities in financial systems.



The technology is also likely to radically reshape labour markets, impacting productivity and economic growth. Widespread adoption could see firms adjust prices more quickly in response to macro-economic changes with repercussions for inflation.



The BIS cautioned that AI also introduces risks, such as new types of cyber attacks, and may amplify existing ones, such as herding, bank runs and financial asset fire sales.



&#8220;The call for action to central banks is to foster a community of practice,&#8221; Shin said. &#8220;To share experience, to share best practice, but also to share data and the models themselves.&#8221;



(Reporting by Marc Jones; editing by Jason Neely)

FILE PHOTO – The tower of the Bank for International Settlements is seen in Basel

Central banks must prepare for profound impact of AI, BIS says

<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="820" height="547" src="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/ZJ7VVLBOAZNETDZF34KQ7NPIJ4-820x547.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-497768" srcset="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/ZJ7VVLBOAZNETDZF34KQ7NPIJ4-820x547.jpg 820w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/ZJ7VVLBOAZNETDZF34KQ7NPIJ4-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/ZJ7VVLBOAZNETDZF34KQ7NPIJ4-135x90.jpg 135w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/ZJ7VVLBOAZNETDZF34KQ7NPIJ4-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/ZJ7VVLBOAZNETDZF34KQ7NPIJ4-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/ZJ7VVLBOAZNETDZF34KQ7NPIJ4-scaled.jpg 2048w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 820px) 100vw, 820px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">FILE PHOTO: AI (Artificial Intelligence) letters are placed on computer motherboard in this illustration taken June 23, 2023. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration//File Photo</figcaption></figure>



LAGOS/NAIROBI/JOHANNESBURG, June 17 (Thomson Reuters Foundation)&nbsp;&#8211;&nbsp;When the Nigerian government announced plans in April to develop a multilingual AI tool to boost digital inclusion across the West African nation, 28-year-old computer science student Lwasinam Lenham Dilli was thrilled.



Dilli had struggled to scrape datasets from the internet to build a large language model (LLM), used to power AI chatbots, in his native Hausa language as part of his final-year project at university.



&#8220;I needed texts in English and their corresponding translation in Hausa but I couldn&#8217;t get anything online, (there was) no clean data,&#8221; Dilli told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.



&#8220;(Creating local language LLMs) is a way to ensure that our local dialects and languages will not be forgotten or left out of the AI ecosystem,&#8221; he added.



The world has been swept up in a whirlwind of AI mania, with tools such as OpenAI&#8217;s ChatGPT, Meta&#8217;s Llama 2, and Mistral AI captivating millions globally with their ability to generate human-like text.



But for many tech-savvy Africans, the excitement has been tempered by a frustrating reality: when languages like Hausa, Amharic, or Kinyarwanda are entered into the chat, many of these advanced systems falter, often producing nonsensical responses.



Technology experts warn the lack of LLMs in African languages will lead to the exclusion of millions of people on the continent, increasing both the digital and economic divide.



The Nigerian government-led initiative to develop a multilingual LLM aims to level the playing field.



&#8220;The LLM will be trained on five low-resource languages and accented English to ensure stronger language representation &#8230; for development of artificial intelligence solutions,&#8221; said Nigeria&#8217;s Digital Economy Minister Bosun Tijani in April.



The government will partner with Nigerian AI startups, and local data will be collected by volunteers who are fluent in any of five Nigerian languages: Yoruba, Hausa, Igbo, Ibibio, and West African lingua franca—Pidgin.



To build the model, the project will also draw on the expertise of more than 7,000 fellows from Nigeria&#8217;s tech talent programme &#8211; a government scheme to train three million people in skills such as coding and programming.



Silas Adekunle, co-founder of Awarri, an AI startup that is part of the initiative, said building a nuanced AI tool that understood Nigeria&#8217;s unique language and cultural landscape presented many challenges.



&#8220;We have so many different accents and languages, and this (LLM) will enable many people and developers to build products that leverage AI but are for the Nigerian market,&#8221; said Adekunle.



&#8220;The scale of the project, especially with limited resources, has required us to be creative in how we train the model, gather the data, compute and label what we have.&#8221;



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-closing-the-ai-language-gap">CLOSING THE AI LANGUAGE GAP</h2>



Africa is home to more than 2,000 languages spoken across 54 countries, according to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).



However, the majority of African languages remain underrepresented on the internet. English dominates the digital space, accounting for around 50% of all websites, followed by Spanish, German, Japanese, and French.



Along with the Nigerian government initiative, there are also a small but growing number of African startups rising to the challenge of developing AI tools in languages like Swahili, Amharic, Zulu and Sesotho.



In Kenya, for instance, health tech firm Jacaranda Health has pioneered the first LLM operating in Swahili to improve maternal healthcare in East Africa.



Built on Meta&#8217;s Llama 3 system, UlizaLlama (AskLlama) aims to refine Jacaranda Health&#8217;s SMS service for low-income Swahili-speaking expectant mothers who have queries ranging from dietary concerns and fetal movement to exercise during pregnancy.



The platform currently provides pre-written automated responses, but once UlizaLlama is integrated by the end of June, it will tailor responses to individual needs, offering more detailed pregnancy guidance and emergency support.



&#8220;A lot of these expectant moms can&#8217;t just do a Google search. UlizaLlama&#8217;s goal is to make sure that we get them the accurate answers in the fastest possible time,&#8221; Jay Patel, Jacaranda Health&#8217;s director of technology, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.



&#8220;We&#8217;re shooting for about 85% accuracy to start with and a faster response time. At the moment, it takes a few minutes to respond, but we are hoping to get that down to less than a minute in the future.&#8221;



In South Africa, the Masakhane initiative is using open-source machine learning to translate African languages.



Lelapa AI, a South African AI research lab, has pioneered VulaVula – a for-profit language processing tool that translates, transcribes and analyses languages in English, Afrikaans, Zulu and Sesotho.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-data-scarcity-ethical-concerns">DATA SCARCITY, ETHICAL CONCERNS</h2>



But AI experts say building LLMs in African languages poses significant challenges, ranging from availability of data to ethical concerns over consent, compensation and copyright.



Many African languages are low-resource languages, meaning there is a scarcity of data to train these models effectively &#8211; unlike high-resource languages such as English or French.



Michael Michie, co-founder of Everse Technology Africa, an AI startup building intelligence into data protection and privacy, said collecting the data needed to train LLMs also raised ethical questions.



In many African communities, oral tradition predominates, and certain communities may not be interested in sharing their language to train LLMs and this should be respected.



&#8220;There are currently no regulations or laws in African countries that address issues related to consent, privacy and compensation to communities when collecting data to train AI tools &#8211; this needs to be addressed,&#8221; said Michie.



&#8220;There are questions of who owns the language and who benefits. There needs to be guidelines to prevent exploitation and ensure the development of these LLMs benefits the people they are meant to serve,&#8221; he added.



Open-source initiatives like Creative Commons, which allow creators to legally share their work with specified conditions like ensuring attribution and non-commercial use, are also not a perfect solution, said some AI experts.



&#8220;At the moment there&#8217;s this push of saying everything should just be under Creative Commons,&#8221; said Vukosi Marivate, associate professor of computer science at the University of Pretoria and co-founder of Lelapa AI.



But if everything is open source, it may be harder to properly reimburse and acknowledge the original contributors to these language models, he said.



&#8220;A lot of people are working on LLMs now because of the prestige, that&#8217;s where the money is, but we need to make sure that our languages are actually being taken care of.&#8221;



(Reporting by Bukola Adebayo, Nita Bhalla and Kim Harrisberg; Editing by Clar Ni Chonghaile)

FILE PHOTO: Illustration shows AI (Artificial Intelligence) letters and computer motherboard

From Swahili to Zulu, African techies develop AI language tools

<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="820" height="573" src="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/EU77SXNC7VKF5PUJALHFIPSWDU-820x573.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-460717" srcset="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/EU77SXNC7VKF5PUJALHFIPSWDU-820x573.jpg 820w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/EU77SXNC7VKF5PUJALHFIPSWDU-300x210.jpg 300w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/EU77SXNC7VKF5PUJALHFIPSWDU-129x90.jpg 129w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/EU77SXNC7VKF5PUJALHFIPSWDU-768x537.jpg 768w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/EU77SXNC7VKF5PUJALHFIPSWDU-1536x1074.jpg 1536w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/EU77SXNC7VKF5PUJALHFIPSWDU-scaled.jpg 2048w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 820px) 100vw, 820px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">FILE PHOTO: A MultiChoice logo is displayed outside the company&#8217;s building in Cape Town, South Africa February 2, 2024. REUTERS/Esa Alexander/File Photo</figcaption></figure>



Pan-African broadcaster MultiChoice reported a steeper full-year loss, as it lost subscribers in its key South African and Nigerian markets, and the naira slumped against the dollar.



Tim Jacobs, the Chief Financial Officer of MultiChoice Group, told CNBC Africa a tough customer environment characterized by declining affordability, resulted in a loss of one million subscribers, led by Nigeria and South Africa where numbers dropped by 5 percent and 9 percent respectively. However, efforts to mitigate losses seemed to be showing signs of progress, he said.



South Africa, Multichoice&#8217;s biggest market has grappled with power shortages over the past few years, with the economy barely growing in 2023, and unemployment remaining close to a record high. In Nigeria, President Bola Tinubu has devalued the naira twice and cut fuel subsidies, resulting in inflation surging for 16 consecutive months. <code> </code>



&#8220;We are seeing customers under significant financial pressure and affordability being a big issue,&#8221; Jacobs said. &#8220;We actually started the end of last quarter of the previous financial year with load-shedding and significant pressure on the consumer. That flowed into the first half of this year and we saw that kind of overall trend, you know, kind of persist through the year,&#8221; Jacobs said.



Amidst the struggles in the traditional television segment, MultiChoice found encouragement in the growth of its streaming service DStv Stream, which witnessed a 139% increase, with 90% of customers being new additions to the platform. Jacobs said this shift towards streaming, primarily among a younger audience, reflects evolving consumer preferences. 



Trading in other African markets was no less difficult, with inflation rates soaring to the upper 20s and 30s, he said. The harsh economic conditions have forced consumers to prioritize basic necessities over discretionary expenses like pay television, leading to what Jacobs called a temporary decline in subscriber numbers. 



Operationally, earnings were rescued by tough cost-cutting measures, that saved the company R1.9 billion. However this was outdone by foreign exchange losses of R4.5 billion, the bulk of them at R3.5 billion owing to the devaluation of the naira exchange rate. 



While acknowledging the traditional television model was under pressure, Jacobs sees solace in the appeal of local content, which constituted 33% of broadcast minutes and garnered 46% of viewership. He acknowledges the global shift towards on-demand content consumption, but argues this will be a gradual transition.



Despite the challenges, sports content continues to be a robust acquisition driver for MultiChoice, with major sporting events bolstering platform engagement. He said the company&#8217;s extensive lineup of local and international content will be a key differentiator in a very competitive media landscape.

FILE PHOTO: MultiChoice logo is displayed outside the company in Cape Town

MultiChoice Losses Mount as Subscriber Numbers Slump; Invests in Streaming Services

<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="820" height="461" src="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/107412522-1715225276125-gettyimages-2012746910-jh_coders2_0063-820x461.webp" alt="" class="wp-image-486123" srcset="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/107412522-1715225276125-gettyimages-2012746910-jh_coders2_0063-820x461.webp 820w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/107412522-1715225276125-gettyimages-2012746910-jh_coders2_0063-300x169.webp 300w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/107412522-1715225276125-gettyimages-2012746910-jh_coders2_0063-160x90.webp 160w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/107412522-1715225276125-gettyimages-2012746910-jh_coders2_0063-768x432.webp 768w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/107412522-1715225276125-gettyimages-2012746910-jh_coders2_0063.webp 1200w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 820px) 100vw, 820px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">55% of leaders say they’re concered about having enough talent to fill roles in the year ahead as AI skills become more relevant than ever before, new study finds. Pixdeluxe | E+ | Getty Images</figcaption></figure>



Today’s winners are learning how to leverage artificial intelligence to stay competitive and relevant — employees and businesses alike.



“AI is not going to replace you. You’re going to be replaced by someone who uses AI to outperform you,” said Laurence Liew, director for AI Innovation at AI Singapore, during a panel discussion at Salesforce’s World Tour Essentials event in Singapore.



While a lot of professionals (45%) worry AI will replace their job, the majority (55%) of leaders are concerned about a lack of talent to fill roles, according to the 2024 Microsoft Work Trends Index.



There is a dearth of talent, and consequently a huge opportunity for people who can learn AI skills, with as many 71% of corporate leaders saying they’d prefer a less experienced candidate with AI skills over a more experienced one without them, according to the report.



While AI has been the talk of the town ever since the launch of OpenAI’s ChatGPT in November 2022, big companies have been slow to integrate the technology and help upskill their talent pools.



There is a gap in the modern workplace between what appears necessary and what is seemingly feasible.



While 79% of executives believe their company should adopt AI to stay competitive, the pressure to generate immediate returns on investment has slowed AI transition, according to the Microsoft study.



As a result, employees around the world are taking matters into their own hands, learning to use AI tools on their own. While upskilling on AI at home can lead to a competitive edge, it also poses a few problems.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-the-risks-of-self-learning-ai">The risks of self-learning AI</h2>



Experts say one of the biggest issues with upskilling on AI at home is that many people don’t know how to do it safely and effectively.



To the naked eye, there are many “free” AI resources online such as ChatGPT and other tools using large language models (LLMs), but experts say these tools aren’t actually free. LLMs are algorithms that can identify, summarize, translate, forecast, and produce information by employing huge datasets.



“There’s nothing free in this world. Your data is the commodity that you are trading,” Liew said. “You should not be using your company data or any of your own personal data [when using free online AI tools].”



Doing so can put sensitive personal or company data at risk. Part of upskilling on AI tools is learning how to do so safely and effectively.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">The must-have AI skill</h2>



The top skill to learn today is communicating effectively with existing AI-powered LLMs, according to Liew. Open AI’s ChatGPT, Microsoft’s Copilot and Google’s Gemini employ LLMs.



“People use ChatGPT wrongly — because it looks exactly like Google search,” Liew told CNBC Make It.



When working with an LLM, the key is to be specific in your prompts.



“You have to give the AI a lot of context — treat AI like a very hardworking intern that will make mistakes occasionally &#8230; If you think about it, if you’re [asking] an intern to do something, it won’t be one sentence. The intern would probably be scratching their head on what to do,” he said.



The best way to upskill on AI tools at home is to use them, according to Liew. Through practice, you can learn how to feed the LLM more descriptive prompts that will help generate your desired outcome.



“You still need to know [your domain] very well [but] the mundane part of looking through 20 files is now done by the AI system — imagine when you can turn around [work] at that kind of speed — the type of transformation that can happen,” Liew said.



Although AI tools may still seem foreign, by next year, “it will be like knowing how to use your spell-checker in Microsoft Word,” Liew said.

107412522-1715225276125-gettyimages-2012746910-jh_coders2_0063

AI may not replace you, but someone who uses it can — here’s the No. 1 skill you need to stay relevant

<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="820" height="461" src="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/107405596-1713952166593-231228limxoutdoor-820x461.png" alt="" class="wp-image-484270" srcset="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/107405596-1713952166593-231228limxoutdoor-820x461.png 820w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/107405596-1713952166593-231228limxoutdoor-300x169.png 300w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/107405596-1713952166593-231228limxoutdoor-160x90.png 160w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/107405596-1713952166593-231228limxoutdoor-768x432.png 768w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/107405596-1713952166593-231228limxoutdoor.png 1200w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 820px) 100vw, 820px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Shenzhen-based LimX Dynamics shows off one of its humanoid robots. Limx Dynamics</figcaption></figure>



BEIJING — ChatGPT-like artificial intelligence is speeding up research and bringing humanoid robots closer to reality in China, home to many of the world’s factories.



AI has been around for decades. What’s changed with the emergence of OpenAI’s ChatGPT chatbot is the ability of AI to better understand and generate content in a human-like way. While the U.S.-based tech is not officially available in China, local companies such as Baidu have released similar chatbots and AI models.



In robotics, the development of generative AI can help machines with understanding and perceiving their environment, said Li Zhang, chief operating officer of Shenzhen-based LimX Dynamics.



About three months after joining the two-year-old startup, Li said he shortened his expectations for how long it would take LimX to produce a humanoid robot capable of not just factory work, but also helping out in a households.



Li originally expected the entire process to take eight to ten years, but now anticipates some use cases will be ready in five to seven years. “After working for a few months, I saw how various tools’ abilities were improved because of AI,” he said in Mandarin, translated by CNBC.



“It has accelerated our entire research and development cycle,” he said.



Companies are rushing into the opportunity. OpenAI itself is backing humanoid robot startups, while Elon Musk’s Tesla is developing its own, called Optimus.



Electric car giant BYD last year invested in Shanghai-based Agibot just months after its founding, according to PitchBook.



And at a high level, Chinese state media in November published a photo of Chinese President Xi Jinping watching a humanoid robot at an exhibition center during his first trip to Shanghai since the pandemic. The robot was developed by Fourier Intelligence.



Before humanoid robots reach households, as LimX ultimately intends, factories can be a lucrative, enclosed scenario in which to deploy them.



China surpassed Japan in 2013 as the world’s largest installer of industrial robots, and now accounts for more than 50% of the global total, according to Stanford’s latest AI Index report.



Electronics, automotive and metal and machinery were the three leading sectors for industrial robot installation in China, the report said.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-impact-on-human-jobs"><a></a>Impact on human jobs</h2>



When it comes fully replacing human workers, however, AI advancements alone aren’t enough.



Even if AI allows a robot to think and make decisions on par with humans, mechanical limitations are a major reason why humanoids can’t yet replace human laborers, LimX’s Li said.



One of LimX’s backers, Future Capital, has also invested in a company called Pan Motor that specializes in motors for humanoids.



Generative AI doesn’t directly help with robotic motion, pointed out Eric Xia, partner at Future Capital, an investor in LimX. But “advances in large language models can help humanoid robots with advanced task planning,” he said in Chinese, translated by CNBC.



LimX’s other investors include Lenovo Capital.



A shift toward factory robots can accelerate, once the cost-per-robot comes down.



Steve Hoffman, chairman of a startup accelerator called Founders Space, said he is working with a Chinese startup called Fastra, which he expects can begin mass robot production in one year. He said he spent time in China this year teaching local businesses how to integrate generative AI.



“We have already received six orders from research institutions,” he said, noting the startup aims to lower the cost per robot to between $50,000 to $100,000 by rollout.



“If we can hit a $50,000 price point, we can sell a lot of robots,” he said, pointing out the robots’ batteries can be charged as they work, 24 hours a day. “Could pay for the robot in a year.”



In pharmaceutical research, generative AI can reduce costs, without cutting into human labor.



“You don’t save costs in our business by having less people. You actually save costs by making fewer experiments that fail,” said Alex Zhavoronkov, chairman of the board, executive director and CEO of Insilico Medicine, which has offices in Hong Kong, New York and other parts of the world.



He noted how large pharmaceutical companies have typically had to spend thousands of dollars to replicate a molecule for testing — and would run a few thousand such tests per program. He claimed that with the help of AI, Insilico only needs to synthesize about 70 molecules per program.



The company published a paper in Nature in March claiming to have reached phase 2 clinical trials for an AI-generated drug.

107405596-1713952166593-231228limxoutdoor

Generative AI is speeding up human-like robot development. What that means for jobs

<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="820" height="462" src="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/107361439-1705616097110-gettyimages-1494104649-2023_vrtg_may_05_0003-820x462.jpeg" alt="" class="wp-image-476716" srcset="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/107361439-1705616097110-gettyimages-1494104649-2023_vrtg_may_05_0003-820x462.jpeg 820w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/107361439-1705616097110-gettyimages-1494104649-2023_vrtg_may_05_0003-300x169.jpeg 300w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/107361439-1705616097110-gettyimages-1494104649-2023_vrtg_may_05_0003-160x90.jpeg 160w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/107361439-1705616097110-gettyimages-1494104649-2023_vrtg_may_05_0003-768x432.jpeg 768w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/107361439-1705616097110-gettyimages-1494104649-2023_vrtg_may_05_0003.jpeg 929w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 820px) 100vw, 820px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Vertigo3d | E+ | Getty Images</figcaption></figure>



The chief technology officer of Ceres Power has warned that as artificial intelligence tools become more widely used for efficiency, there is a risk that this could result in even higher energy consumption.



“What scares me is the energy consumption if you’re using ChatGPT [for simple queries],” Caroline Hargrove said during an “IOT: Powering the Digital Economy” panel on the new energy landscape.



Hargrove is CTO of Ceres Power, a developer of clean energy technology, including electrolysers for green hydrogen.



An International Energy Agency report, published in January, highlighted that on average a typical Google search uses 0.3 watt-hours of electricity versus 2.9 watt-hours for a ChatGPT request.



The report suggested that when this technology is incorporated into 9 billion searches daily, it would require nearly 10 terawatt-hours of additional electricity a year.  



More broadly, the IEA’s report said that by 2026, the “AI industry is expected to have grown exponentially to consume at least ten times its [electricity] demand in 2023.”



Hargrove said if this consumption was not managed properly “then the perverse effect could happen that we use so much more energy.”



“So as much as I’m a big fan in using the data to really optimize everything, we should use it to reduce our consumption, but the perverse effect can happen when you have a new toy and, and people getting behind it at [such] a rate,” she said.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-responsible-users-of-ai"><a></a>‘Responsible users’ of AI</h2>



Mary de Wysocki, chief sustainability officer at technology company Cisco, made a similar point in that it was important to be “responsible users of [AI] where we know where can add the benefit and not just use it because it’s potentially fun.”



Meanwhile, Bertrand Piccard, founder and chairman of the environmental non-profit organization Solar Impulse Foundation, said AI is a “fantastic way to reduce energy consumption” if it is well managed.



Piccard referred to the example of smart electricity grids using this technology that “will integrate intermittent renewable energy … with storage, with the distribution, with the consumption which means that almost no energy will be lost.”



“So [these are] the things that give me hope,” he said.



A report by the Climate Action Against Disinformation (CAAD) coalition, published in March, looked at the risks that AI could pose amid the climate crisis, including its growing energy demand.



Based on its findings, the coalition recommended that regulators ensure technology companies are transparent in reporting the energy used and emissions produced by their AI models.



CAAD also said governments should enforce these transparency rules with “clear, strong penalties” if companies fail to comply.

107361439-1705616097110-gettyimages-1494104649-2023_vrtg_may_05_0003

Green hydrogen tech boss warns of AI energy consumption risk

<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="820" height="462" src="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/107400835-1713107631482-gettyimages-89133867-win308_sub305_002-820x462.jpeg" alt="" class="wp-image-476713" srcset="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/107400835-1713107631482-gettyimages-89133867-win308_sub305_002-820x462.jpeg 820w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/107400835-1713107631482-gettyimages-89133867-win308_sub305_002-300x169.jpeg 300w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/107400835-1713107631482-gettyimages-89133867-win308_sub305_002-160x90.jpeg 160w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/107400835-1713107631482-gettyimages-89133867-win308_sub305_002-768x432.jpeg 768w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/107400835-1713107631482-gettyimages-89133867-win308_sub305_002.jpeg 929w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 820px) 100vw, 820px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Win-initiative/neleman | Stone | Getty Images</figcaption></figure>



With about 100 million tracks available and over 600 million subscribers, helping listeners find the music they will love has become a navigational challenge for Spotify. It’s the promise of personalization and meaningful recommendations that will give the vast catalog more meaning, and that is central to Spotify’s mission.



The streaming audio giant’s suite of recommendation tools has grown over the years: Spotify Home feed,<a href="https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__newsroom.spotify.com_2019-2D05-2D02_five-2Dways-2Dto-2Dmake-2Dyour-2Ddiscover-2Dweekly-2Dplaylists-2Deven-2Dmore-2Dpersonalized_&amp;d=DwMFaQ&amp;c=slrrB7dE8n7gBJbeO0g-IQ&amp;r=0CWepIbi9zbaptf4QjVSaQ&amp;m=h9I6Nob4JYekdULzm3jgGOyZdoRdqnNui4auLB7TtMlDKP_ZGUWB6PrjmpMYbufk&amp;s=0QBH1FDSLbahb2il0Si1F0IY6Roe1C9utj_AdXH9x-A&amp;e=" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener"> </a>Discover Weekly<a href="https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__newsroom.spotify.com_2019-2D05-2D02_five-2Dways-2Dto-2Dmake-2Dyour-2Ddiscover-2Dweekly-2Dplaylists-2Deven-2Dmore-2Dpersonalized_&amp;d=DwMFaQ&amp;c=slrrB7dE8n7gBJbeO0g-IQ&amp;r=0CWepIbi9zbaptf4QjVSaQ&amp;m=h9I6Nob4JYekdULzm3jgGOyZdoRdqnNui4auLB7TtMlDKP_ZGUWB6PrjmpMYbufk&amp;s=0QBH1FDSLbahb2il0Si1F0IY6Roe1C9utj_AdXH9x-A&amp;e=" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">,</a> Blend, Daylist, and<a href="https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__newsroom.spotify.com_2021-2D03-2D31_introducing-2Dnew-2Dspotify-2Dmixes-2Dpersonalized-2Dplaylists-2Dfeaturing-2Dyour-2Dfavorite-2Dartists-2Dgenres-2Dand-2Ddecades_&amp;d=DwMFaQ&amp;c=slrrB7dE8n7gBJbeO0g-IQ&amp;r=0CWepIbi9zbaptf4QjVSaQ&amp;m=h9I6Nob4JYekdULzm3jgGOyZdoRdqnNui4auLB7TtMlDKP_ZGUWB6PrjmpMYbufk&amp;s=T0MnheFfxWq86g36mOmmh_m-Wzgl35V9p7jnRNYwGtM&amp;e=" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener"> </a>Made for You Mixes. And in recent years, there have been signs that it is working. According to data released by Spotify at its 2022 Investor Day, artist discoveries every month on Spotify had reached 22 billion, up from 10 billion in 2018, “and we’re nowhere near done,” the company stated at that time.



Over the past decade or more, Spotify has been investing in AI and, in particular, in machine learning. Its recently launched AI DJ may be its biggest bet yet that technology will allow subscribers to better personalize listening sessions and discover new music. The AI DJ mimics the vibe of radio by announcing the names of songs and lead-in to tracks, something aimed in part to help ease listeners into extending out of their comfort zones. An existing pain point for AI algorithms — which can be excellent at giving listeners what it knows they already like — is anticipating when you want to break out of that comfort zone. 



The AI DJ combines personalization technology, generative AI, and a dynamic AI voice, and listeners can tap the DJ button when they want to hear something new, and something less-directly-derived from their established likes. Behind the dulcet tones of an AI DJ there are people, tech experts and music experts, who aim to improve the recommendation capacity of Spotify’s tools. The company has hundreds of music editors and experts across the globe. A Spotify spokesperson said the generative AI tool allows the human experts to “scale their innate knowledge in ways never before possible.” &nbsp;



The data on a particular song or artist captures a few attributes: particular musical features, and which song or artist it has been typically paired with&nbsp;among the millions of listening sessions whose data the AI algorithm can access.&nbsp;Gathering information about the song is a fairly easy process, including release year, genre, and mood — from happy to danceable or melancholic. Various musical attributes, such as tempo, key, and instrumentation, are also identified. Combining this data associated with millions of listening sessions and other users’ preferences helps to generate new recommendations, and makes the leap possible from aggregated data to individual listener assumptions.



In its simplest formulation, “Users who liked Y also liked Z. We know you like Y, so you might like Z,” is how an AI finds matches. And Spotify says it’s working. “Since launching DJ, we’ve found that when DJ listeners hear commentary alongside personal music recommendations, they’re&nbsp;more willing to try something new (or listen to a song they may have otherwise skipped),” the spokesperson said.&nbsp;



If successful, it’s not just listeners that get relief from a pain point. A great discovery tool is as beneficial to the artists seeking to build connections with new fans.



Julie Knibbe, founder &amp; CEO of Music Tomorrow — which aims to help artists connect with more listeners by understanding how algorithms work and how to better work with them — says everyone is trying to figure out how to balance familiarity and novelty in a meaningful way, and everyone is leaning on AI algorithms to help make this possible. Be she says the balance between discovering new music and staying with established patterns is a central unresolved issue for all involved, from Spotify to listeners and the artists.



“Any AI is only good at what you tell them to do,” Knibbe said. “These recommender systems have been around for over a decade and they’ve become very good at predicting what you will like. What they can’t do is know what’s in your head, specifically when you want to venture out into a new musical terrain or category.”&nbsp;



Spotify’s Daylist is an attempt to use generative AI to take into account established tastes, but also the varying contexts that can shape and reshape a listeners’ tastes across the course of a day, and make new recommendations that fit various moods, activities and vibes. Knibbe says it’s possible that improvements like these continue, and the AI gets better at finding the formula for how much novelty a listener wants, but she added, “the assumption that people want to discover new music all the time is not true.”



Most people still return, fairly happily, to familiar musical terrain and listening patterns.&nbsp;



“You have various&nbsp;profiles of listeners, curators, experts … people put different demands on the AI,” Knibbe said. “Experts are more difficult to surprise, but they aren’t the majority of listeners, who tend to be more casual,” and whose Spotify usage, she says, often amounts to creating a “comfortable background” to daily life.



Technology optimists often speak in terms of an era of “abundance.” With 100 million songs available, but many listeners preferring the same 100 songs a million times, it’s easy to understand why a new balance is being sought. But Ben Ratliff, a music critic and author of “Every Song Ever: Twenty Ways to Listen in an Age of Musical Plenty,” says algorithms are less solution to this problem than a further entrenching of it.



“Spotify is good at catching onto popular sensibilities and creating a soundtrack for them,” Ratliff said. “Its Sadgirl Starter Pack playlist, for instance, has a great name and about a million and a half likes. Unfortunately, under the banner of a gift, the SSP simplifies the oceanic complexity of young-adult depression into a small collection of dependably ‘yearny’ music acts, and makes hard clichés of music and sensibility form more quickly.” 



Works of curation that are clearly made by actual people with actual preferences remain Ratliff’s preference.&nbsp;Even a good playlist, he says, might have been made without much intention and conscience, but just a developed sense of pattern recognition, “whether it’s patterns of obscurity or patterns of the broadly known,” he said.



Depending on the individual, AI may have equal chances of becoming either a utopian or dystopian solution within the 100-million track universe.&nbsp;Ratliff says most users should keep it more simple in their streaming music journeys. “As long as you realize that the app will never know you in the way you want to be known, and as long as you know what you’re looking for, or have some good prompts at the ready, you can find lots of great music on Spotify.”&nbsp;

107400835-1713107631482-gettyimages-89133867-win308_sub305_002

How Spotify AI plans to know what’s going on inside your head, and find the right track for it

<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="820" height="547" src="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/GettyImages-1701923070-820x547.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-474613" srcset="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/GettyImages-1701923070-820x547.jpg 820w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/GettyImages-1701923070-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/GettyImages-1701923070-135x90.jpg 135w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/GettyImages-1701923070-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/GettyImages-1701923070-1536x1025.jpg 1536w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/GettyImages-1701923070-scaled.jpg 2048w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 820px) 100vw, 820px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Jamie Dimon, chief executive officer of JPMorgan Chase &amp; Co., during a Bloomberg Television interview on the sidelines of the JPMorgan Tech Stars Leadership Forum in London, UK, on Monday, Oct. 2, 2023. &#8220;Your children are going to live to 100 and not have cancer because of technology,&#8221; Dimon said. Photographer: Jason Alden/Bloomberg via Getty Images</figcaption></figure>



Jamie Dimon, the veteran CEO and chairman of JPMorgan Chase, said he was convinced that artificial intelligence will have a profound impact on society.



In his annual letter to shareholders released Monday, Dimon chose AI as the first topic in his update of issues facing the biggest U.S. bank by assets — ahead of geopolitical risks, recent acquisitions and regulatory matters.



“While we do not know the full effect or the precise rate at which AI will change our business — or how it will affect society at large — we are completely convinced the consequences will be extraordinary,” Dimon said.



The impact will be “possibly as transformational as some of the major technological inventions of the past several hundred years: Think the printing press, the steam engine, electricity, computing and the Internet.”



Dimon’s letter, read widely in the business world because of his status as one of the most successful leaders in finance, hit a wide variety of topics. The CEO said that he had ongoing concerns about inflationary pressures and reiterated his warning that the world may be entering the riskiest era in geopolitics since World War II.



But his focus on AI, first mentioned in this format in a 2017 shareholder letter, stood out. The technology, which has gained in prominence since ChatGPT became a viral sensation in late 2022, can generate human-sounding responses to queries. Enthusiasm for AI has fueled the meteoric rise in chipmaker Nvidia and helped propel tech names to new heights.  



JPMorgan now has more than 2,000 AI and machine learning employees and data scientists, Dimon said. But the technology could ultimately touch all of the bank’s roughly 310,000 employees, assisting some workers while replacing others.



“Over time, we anticipate that our use of AI has the potential to augment virtually every job, as well as impact our workforce composition,” Dimon said. “It may reduce certain job categories or roles, but it may create others as well.”



This story is developing. Please check back for updates.

JPMorgan Chase & Co. Chief Executive Officer Jamie Dimon Interview

Jamie Dimon says AI may be as impactful on humanity as printing press, electricity and computers

<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="820" height="598" src="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/100432242-larry-ellison-ceo-oracle-getty-820x598.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-474536" srcset="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/100432242-larry-ellison-ceo-oracle-getty-820x598.jpg 820w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/100432242-larry-ellison-ceo-oracle-getty-300x219.jpg 300w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/100432242-larry-ellison-ceo-oracle-getty-123x90.jpg 123w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/100432242-larry-ellison-ceo-oracle-getty-768x560.jpg 768w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/100432242-larry-ellison-ceo-oracle-getty-1536x1120.jpg 1536w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/100432242-larry-ellison-ceo-oracle-getty-scaled.jpg 2048w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 820px) 100vw, 820px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Oracle Chairman Larry Ellison Getty Images</figcaption></figure>



Every tech company is talking up its AI opportunity. Oracle is no exception. But during an earnings call in March, Oracle’s Larry Ellison laid out a future market opportunity focused on a major customer that investors may think about less often that Fortune 500 companies.



The Oracle founder, former CEO and current chairman and chief technology officer, sees national and state government applications being run on platforms like Oracle Cloud Infrastructure to a much greater degree than today, and indicated that it’s starting to happen in a variety of ways.



“We talk about, you know, winning business with companies. For the first time, we’re beginning to win business for countries,” Ellison said. “We have a number of countries where we’re negotiating sovereign regions with the national government.”



Major tech companies vying for massive government contracts in the cloud are nothing new. Microsoft and Amazon had a lengthy battle over a cloud deal with the Department of Defense, and both those AI players as well as Oracle and Google ended up all in on a $9 billion DoD contract in 2022.



But Ellison went further in his prediction when speaking with analysts on the recent earnings call, saying “Every government, pretty much every government, is going to want a sovereign cloud and a dedicated region for that government.”



Oracle, which works with Nvidia and Microsoft on generative AI capabilities, has already helped use cloud tech to cut red tape for countries. One example Ellison gave was Albania. It is trying to ascend to the European Union with the help of chatGPT, with the generative AI helping to decipher and summarize its laws and aid the country in what it needs to change in order to be compliant with E.U. regulations.



“It took Serbia eight years to harmonize their laws to be able to join the E.U.,” Ellison said. “Albania is facing the same thing, but with generative AI, we can read the entire corpus of the Albanian laws and&nbsp;actually harmonize their laws with the EU in probably more like 18 months to two years.”



Some analysts are skeptical of Ellison’s talk as being anything more than typical C-suite rallying for a key business unit. Oracle shares are up about 21% YTD, but Barclays analyst Raimo Lenschow expressed concern about lower OCI growth during its latest earnings, which could “worry investors, as this is the main investment story.”



A version of future featuring cloud services and artificial intelligence-powered solutions can make government more efficient. Ellison said for starters, redundancy is a focus for government, in the case of disaster and disaster recovery. But it’s also moving into health care information and internet access projects.



Countries including Serbia are standardizing on Oracle Cloud Infrastructure and using generative AI for processes like automating health care. Deals related to delivery of internet services in partnership with Elon Musk’s Starlink to remote areas are taking place in Kenya and Rwanda, where OCI and Starlink are mapping rural farms to see which crops are growing in what area, and if they are getting enough nutrients like nitrogen and water. “These maps are AI-assisted, help them plan their agricultural output and predict their agricultural output, predict markets, the logistics of the agricultural output, doing all of all of those things as next-generation national applications,” Ellison said.



Food security, rural school and rural hospital internet access, are other examples of what Ellison said are among the “all sorts of interesting new AI applications out there that you’ve probably never heard of before, at least I hadn’t heard of before until these last 12 months now that we’ve worked on and we’re now in the process of delivering.”



He also mentioned automation of vaccination programs, and other healthcare program “across the board.”



“We’re living in a world where like data and information is the gold of the future,” said Dan Gardner, CEO of digital strategy agency Code and Theory. “If the government can get access and action on that their data faster, why would we want to slow that down? We want that to be as efficient as possible. A lot of that is like mundane human resources, that maybe those people could be doing something else that is way more valuable.”



Cloud and generative AI applications allowing countries to give rural areas internet access could increase educational opportunities and create more economic value. It could also allow citizens to have more insight into government processes, said Tapan Parikh, Cornell University associate professor. “One thing technology’s always been good at is potentially making bureaucracies more efficient, or at least more transparent internally,” he said.



<h3 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-black-mirror-governments">‘Black Mirror’ governments</h3>



But the push to move more government processes to the cloud is also opening the door to new risks, especially as countries trust newly developed generative AI systems. While they may make processes faster than ever, there are bound to be mistakes as the technology develops and could make citizen data accessible to cyber criminals. “We shouldn’t use these technologies as an excuse to not maintain oversight and control over political processes,” Parikh said. “Certainly, I think that’s a very important thing, particularly when you’re dealing with countries that may not have the same kind of governance capacity.” Oracle did not respond to a request for additional comment on Ellison’s earnings call discussion.



“There’s the ‘Black Mirror’ bad side of it: Big Brother, data wars, AI warfare and all that stuff,” Garder said. “As far as like removing red tape and being more efficient and getting better use out of crops across the country, that’s incredible. That’s the multiplier of humanity that could really improve because of AI.”



AI raises a host of concerns.



Gardner pointed to the proliferation of more generative content in an election year around the world and all the issues related to tech-enabled interference. “Maybe it’s not like chips on the ground. But it’s data security, authentication of who you are, who governments are, what content you’re viewing, all the connection points between financial systems, and AI governance. Using AI as a tool of destruction is quite scary.”&nbsp;



“No big government in the world can afford to move all of their services and especially critical ones like defense, taxes, health care, completely into the cloud and into the hands of gen AI,”&nbsp;said Simone Bohnenberger, chief product officer at cloud company Phrase. “It’s just not in the realm of, I think it’s not responsible to do that. The potential risks outweigh the benefits of doing that.“ OpenAI, which created ChatGPT, is mostly trained on existing content on the internet. That could pose a problem, especially when text from lesser known languages like Albanian need to be analyzed, Bohnenberger said. “If you look at the World Wide Web or the internet, the vast majority of content there’s English, I think a quarter of the content is English, followed by Chinese,” she said. “Albanian is a minority. It’s very questionable for me how well that actually works for a small country like Albania and like an outlier language, because there’s just not much data you can train a model on. And if you don’t have much data, then the outputs will be very messy.”



Then there’s security and data risks with allowing foreign companies access to citizen data, Parikh said. Even the U.S., with all its resources, has been vulnerable to data hacks, including a recent February incident with contractor CGI Federal which exposed personally identifiable information on employees. The recent battle between the U.S. and China over TikTok is an example of how control of sensitive consumer data can be interjected into geopolitics. “I think certainly that’s a concern going forward for countries who are working with vendors from different countries,” Parikh said.

100432242-larry-ellison-ceo-oracle-getty

Oracle’s Larry Ellison thinks every government will want to build a ‘sovereign’ AI cloud in the future

<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="820" height="567" src="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/https___cloudfront-us-east-2.images.arcpublishing.com_reuters_UZOWVLNZ2ZLYVEQLY5SBKO4ZIY-820x567.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-473622" srcset="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/https___cloudfront-us-east-2.images.arcpublishing.com_reuters_UZOWVLNZ2ZLYVEQLY5SBKO4ZIY-820x567.jpg 820w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/https___cloudfront-us-east-2.images.arcpublishing.com_reuters_UZOWVLNZ2ZLYVEQLY5SBKO4ZIY-300x207.jpg 300w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/https___cloudfront-us-east-2.images.arcpublishing.com_reuters_UZOWVLNZ2ZLYVEQLY5SBKO4ZIY-130x90.jpg 130w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/https___cloudfront-us-east-2.images.arcpublishing.com_reuters_UZOWVLNZ2ZLYVEQLY5SBKO4ZIY-768x531.jpg 768w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/https___cloudfront-us-east-2.images.arcpublishing.com_reuters_UZOWVLNZ2ZLYVEQLY5SBKO4ZIY-1536x1062.jpg 1536w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/https___cloudfront-us-east-2.images.arcpublishing.com_reuters_UZOWVLNZ2ZLYVEQLY5SBKO4ZIY.jpg 1920w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 820px) 100vw, 820px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">The logo of Swiss Adecco Group is seen at its headquarters in Zurich, Switzerland October 30, 2018. REUTERS/Arnd Wiegmann</figcaption></figure>



ZURICH, April 5 (Reuters)&nbsp;&#8211;&nbsp;Artificial intelligence will lead to many companies employing fewer people in the next five years, staffing provider Adecco Group&nbsp;ADEN.S&nbsp;said on Friday, in a new survey highlighting the upheaval AI will bring to the workplace.



Some 41% of senior executives expect to have smaller workforces because of AI technology, Adecco said in a report based on a survey of executives at 2,000 large companies worldwide.



Generative AI, which can create text, photos and videos in response to open-ended prompts, has spurred both hope it could eliminate repetitive tasks and fear it will make some jobs obsolete.



Tech companies, including global giants Google&nbsp;GOOGL.O&nbsp;and Microsoft&nbsp;MSFT.O, have embarked on a wave of layoffs in recent months as they shift their focus to systems like OpenAI&#8217;s ChatGPT and Google&#8217;s chatbot Gemini.



The Adecco survey is one of the largest into the AI topic, and follows a 2023 World Economic Forum study which said 25% of companies expected AI to trigger job losses, while 50% expected the technology to create new roles.



But while most senior executives surveyed by Adecco say AI is a game changer, the vast majority&nbsp;say they&nbsp;have not made enough progress in adopting the technology.



&#8220;Almost all jobs are going to be impacted by AI one way or another,&#8221; Adecco CEO Denis Machuel told Reuters. &#8220;AI can be a job killer and it can also be a job creator.



&#8220;Ten years ago there was this big fear many jobs are going to be destroyed by digital, when actually lots of jobs have been created by the digital world,&#8221; he said. &#8220;Between jobs created by AI and jobs destroyed, we believe this is going to be balanced.&#8221;



Companies needed to prepare for the disruption by training their staff to work with AI, Machuel said, rather than relying on recruiting specialists from outside.



Adecco polled businesses in the United States, Britain, France, Germany, Japan, Spain, Canada, Australia and Singapore. Sectors covered included defence, pharma, healthcare, industry and logistics.



The Swiss company, which uses AI itself, for example in helping create resumes for clients, also sees the technology offering &#8220;massive opportunity&#8221; in its work with customers.



&#8220;We already engaged in training and up-skilling people on behalf of our clients,&#8221; Machuel said. &#8220;We&#8217;ve sold a lot of consulting projects and the ramp-up that we see on that is quite interesting.&#8221;



(Reporting by John Revill; Editing by Tomasz Janowski)

https___cloudfront-us-east-2.images.arcpublishing.com_reuters_UZOWVLNZ2ZLYVEQLY5SBKO4ZIY

AI seen cutting worker numbers, survey by staffing company Adecco shows

<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="820" height="547" src="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/GettyImages-1760011544-820x547.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-472610" srcset="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/GettyImages-1760011544-820x547.jpg 820w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/GettyImages-1760011544-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/GettyImages-1760011544-135x90.jpg 135w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/GettyImages-1760011544-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/GettyImages-1760011544-1536x1025.jpg 1536w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/GettyImages-1760011544-scaled.jpg 2048w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 820px) 100vw, 820px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">02 November 2023, Great Britain, Milton Keynes: U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris (l) is welcomed by Rishi Sunak (r) , Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, at the &#8220;AI Safety Summit 2023&#8221; (International Summit on Artificial Intelligence Safety) at Bletchley Park. Photo: Soeren Stache/dpa (Photo by Soeren Stache/picture alliance via Getty Images)</figcaption></figure>



The United States and Britain on Monday announced a new partnership on the science of artificial intelligence safety, amid growing concerns about upcoming next-generation versions.



Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo and British Technology Secretary Michelle Donelan signed a memorandum of understanding in Washington to jointly develop advanced AI model testing, following commitments announced at an AI Safety Summit in Bletchley Park in November.



“We all know AI is the defining technology of our generation,” Raimondo said. “This partnership will accelerate both of our institutes work across the full spectrum to address the risks of our national security concerns and the concerns of our broader society.”



Britain and the United States are among countries establishing government-led AI safety institutes.



Britain said in October its institute would examine and test new types of AI, while the United States said in November it was launching its own safety institute to evaluate risks from so-called frontier AI models and is now working with 200 companies and entites.



Under the formal partnership, Britain and the United States plan to perform at least one joint testing exercise on a publicly accessible model and are considering exploring personnel exchanges between the institutes. Both are working to develop similar partnerships with other countries to promote AI safety.



“This is the first agreement of its kind anywhere in the world,” Donelan said. “AI is already an extraordinary force for good in our society, and has vast potential to tackle some of the world’s biggest challenges, but only if we are able to grip those risks.”



Generative AI &#8211; which can create text, photos and videos in response to open-ended prompts &#8211; has spurred excitement as well as fears it could make some jobs obsolete, upend elections and potentially overpower humans and catastrophic effects.



In a joint interview with Reuters Monday, Raimondo and Donelan urgent joint action was needed to address AI risks.



“Time is of the essence because the next set of models are about to be released, which will be much, much more capable,” Donelan said. “We have a focus one the areas that we are dividing and conquering and really specializing.”



Raimondo said she would raise AI issues at a meeting of the U.S.-EU Trade and Technology Council in Belgium Thursday.



The Biden administration plans to soon announce additions to its AI team, Raimondo said. “We are pulling in the full resources of the U.S. government.”



Both countries plan to share key information on capabilities and risks associated with AI models and systems and technical research on AI safety and security.



In October, Biden signed an executive order that aims to reduce the risks of AI. In January, the Commerce Department said it was proposing to require U.S. cloud companies to determine whether foreign entities are accessing U.S. data centers to train AI models.



Britain said in February it would spend more than 100 million pounds ($125.5 million) to launch nine new research hubs and AI train regulators about the technology.



Raimondo said she was especially concerned about the threat of AI applied to bioterrorism or a nuclear war simulation.



“Those are the things where the consequences could be catastrophic and so we really have to have zero tolerance for some of these models being used for that capability,” she said.

International AI Summit in Great Britain

US, Britain announce partnership on AI safety, testing

<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="820" height="513" src="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/CVOGAFD32FMRJAWUSIJDZZTLS4-820x513.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-470799" srcset="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/CVOGAFD32FMRJAWUSIJDZZTLS4-820x513.jpg 820w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/CVOGAFD32FMRJAWUSIJDZZTLS4-300x188.jpg 300w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/CVOGAFD32FMRJAWUSIJDZZTLS4-144x90.jpg 144w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/CVOGAFD32FMRJAWUSIJDZZTLS4-768x481.jpg 768w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/CVOGAFD32FMRJAWUSIJDZZTLS4-1536x961.jpg 1536w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/CVOGAFD32FMRJAWUSIJDZZTLS4-scaled.jpg 2048w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 820px) 100vw, 820px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">FILE PHOTO: Figurines with computers and smartphones are seen in front of the words &#8220;Artificial Intelligence AI&#8221; in this illustration taken, February 19, 2024. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo</figcaption></figure>



March 28 (Reuters)&nbsp;&#8211;&nbsp;The White House said Thursday it is requiring federal agencies using artificial intelligence to adopt &#8220;concrete safeguards&#8221; by Dec. 1 to protect Americans’ rights and ensure safety as the government expands AI use in a wide range of applications.



The Office of Management and Budget issued a directive to federal agencies to monitor, assess and test AI’s impacts &#8220;on the public, mitigate the risks of algorithmic discrimination, and provide the public with transparency into how the government uses AI.&#8221; Agencies must also conduct risk assessments and set operational and governance metrics.



The White House said agencies &#8220;will be required to implement concrete safeguards when using AI in a way that could impact Americans&#8217; rights or safety&#8221; including detailed public disclosures so the public knows how and when artificial intelligence is being used by the government.



President Joe Biden signed an executive order in October invoking the Defense Production Act to require developers of AI systems posing risks to U.S. national security, the economy, public health or safety to share the results of safety tests with the U.S. government before publicly released.



The White House on Thursday said new safeguards will ensure air travelers can opt out from Transportation Security Administration facial recognition use without delay in screening. When AI is used in federal healthcare to support diagnostics decisions a human must oversee &#8220;the process to verify the tools’ results.&#8221;



Generative AI &#8211; which can create text, photos and videos in response to open-ended prompts &#8211; has spurred excitement as well as fears it could lead to job losses, upend elections and potentially overpower humans and catastrophic effects.



The White House is requiring government agencies to release inventories of AI use cases, report metrics about AI use and release government-owned AI code, models, and data if it does not pose risks.



The Biden administration cited ongoing federal AI uses, including the Federal Emergency Management Agency employing AI to assess structural hurricane damage, while the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention uses AI to predict spread of disease and detect opioid use. The Federal Aviation Administration is using AI to help &#8220;deconflict air traffic in major metropolitan areas to improve travel time.&#8221;



The White House plans to hire 100 AI professionals to promote the safe use of AI and is requiring federal agencies to designate chief AI officers within 60 days.



In January, the Biden administration proposed requiring U.S. cloud companies to determine whether foreign entities are accessing U.S. data centers to train AI models through &#8220;know your customer&#8221; rules.



(Reporting by David Shepardson; Editing by Michael Perry)

FILE PHOTO: Illustration shows words “Artificial Intelligence AI\

US requiring new AI safeguards for government use, transparency

<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="820" height="569" src="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/GettyImages-480163885-820x569.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-470766" srcset="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/GettyImages-480163885-820x569.jpg 820w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/GettyImages-480163885-300x208.jpg 300w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/GettyImages-480163885-130x90.jpg 130w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/GettyImages-480163885-768x533.jpg 768w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/GettyImages-480163885-1536x1065.jpg 1536w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/GettyImages-480163885-scaled.jpg 2048w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 820px) 100vw, 820px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">THE HAGUE, NETHERLANDS &#8211; MARCH 23:Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte meets with the President of the People&#8217;s Republic of China Xi Jinping at the Catshuis March 23, 2014 in The Hague, Netherlands. The Nuclear Security Summit, held March 24-25, will be attended by world leaders and is aimed at preventing nuclear terrorism. (Photo by Valerie Kuypers-Pool/Getty Images</figcaption></figure>



China’s technological progress cannot be stopped, Chinese President Xi Jinping told Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte when they met in Beijing Wednesday for talks on areas such as the critical semiconductor industry.



“The Chinese people also have legitimate development rights, and no force can stop the pace of China’s scientific and technological progress,” said Xi, according to Xinhua News Agency.



Xi said China will “continue to pursue a win-win approach.”



Relations between China and the Netherlands have been strained since the the Netherlands, together with the U.S., blocked exports of advanced chip technology to China over concerns they could be used for military purposes.



Semiconductor chips are critical components which can be found in everything from smartphones to automobiles.



Dutch tech giant ASML has been barred from exporting extreme ultraviolet lithography machines to China — it is the only company currently capable of making such machines To date, it has not shipped a single EUV machine to China yet.



Such EUV lithography machines are crucial for chip manufacturing and are used by companies like Taiwan’s TSMC to make the smallest and most sophisticated chips.



In January, the Netherlands barred ASML from exporting some of its deep ultraviolet lithography systems to China, which are used to make slightly less advanced chips.



Beijing slammed the Dutch government’s move, urging the Netherlands to “uphold an objective and fair position and market principles” and “protect the shared interests” of the two countries and their companies.



“Creating scientific and technological barriers and severing industrial and supply chains will only lead to division and confrontation,” Xi said Wednesday, according to Xinhua state media.



He said cooperation is the only way and added that “decoupling and breaking the chain” is not an option.



Xi said China is ready to continue dialogue with the Netherlands and urged the Dutch side to “provide a fair and transparent business environment for Chinese enterprises.”



According to Reuters, Rutte said Wednesday the Netherlands tried to ensure that export restrictions, when related to semiconductor industry and companies like ASML, are never aimed at one country. “We always try to make sure the impact is limited,” he was quoted as saying.



Chinese state media reported that Rutte responded by saying decoupling is not a policy choice for the Dutch government either, “since any act undermining China’s development interests will only boomerang.”

World Leaders Gather For Nuclear Security Summit 2014

Xi tells Dutch prime minister: No force can stop China’s tech advance

<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="820" height="462" src="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/107251051-1685980909876-IMG_0399-820x462.jpeg" alt="" class="wp-image-470431" srcset="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/107251051-1685980909876-IMG_0399-820x462.jpeg 820w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/107251051-1685980909876-IMG_0399-300x169.jpeg 300w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/107251051-1685980909876-IMG_0399-160x90.jpeg 160w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/107251051-1685980909876-IMG_0399-768x432.jpeg 768w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/107251051-1685980909876-IMG_0399.jpeg 929w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 820px) 100vw, 820px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">The Worldwide Developers Conference stage. CNBC/Kif Leswing</figcaption></figure>



Apple on Tuesday announced that its annual developers conference, WWDC, will take place June 10 through June 14.



The conference will be livestreamed on Apple’s website, although the company is inviting some software makers to its campus on the first day to “celebrate in person,” Apple said.



At this year’s conference, Apple could reveal its long-awaited artificial intelligence strategy and consumer features. In February, Cook said Apple was “investing significantly” in AI and teased an AI-related announcement “later this year” that many analysts believe will come at the Worldwide Developers Conference.



Apple typically reveals the latest versions of its iPhone, iPad, Mac and Apple TV software at WWDC via a “keynote” video on the first day, led by CEO Tim Cook and other Apple staff, which is also streamed on YouTube. At some past conferences, the company has also revealed new professional-oriented hardware, such as Mac laptops.



At this year’s conference, Apple also plans to reveal the first major software update to the Vision Pro, the virtual reality headset it launched earlier this year.

107251051-1685980909876-IMG_0399

Apple announces its big annual conference, where it could reveal its AI strategy

<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="820" height="461" src="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/107381656-1709554734955-gettyimages-1232607338-AA_30042021_335705-820x461.jpeg" alt="" class="wp-image-470146" srcset="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/107381656-1709554734955-gettyimages-1232607338-AA_30042021_335705-820x461.jpeg 820w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/107381656-1709554734955-gettyimages-1232607338-AA_30042021_335705-300x169.jpeg 300w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/107381656-1709554734955-gettyimages-1232607338-AA_30042021_335705-160x90.jpeg 160w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/107381656-1709554734955-gettyimages-1232607338-AA_30042021_335705-768x432.jpeg 768w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/107381656-1709554734955-gettyimages-1232607338-AA_30042021_335705-1536x864.jpeg 1536w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/107381656-1709554734955-gettyimages-1232607338-AA_30042021_335705.jpeg 1600w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 820px) 100vw, 820px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Photo: via CNBC</figcaption></figure>



The European Union on Monday began an investigation into Apple, Alphabet and Meta, in its first probe under the sweeping new Digital Markets Act tech legislation.



“Today, the Commission has opened non-compliance investigations under the Digital Markets Act (DMA) into&nbsp;Alphabet’s&nbsp;rules on steering in Google Play&nbsp;and&nbsp;self-preferencing on Google Search,&nbsp;Apple’s rules on steering in the App Store&nbsp;and&nbsp;the choice screen for Safari&nbsp;and&nbsp;Meta’s&nbsp;‘pay or consent model,’” the European Commission said in a statement.



The first two probes focus on Alphabet and Apple and relate to so-called anti-steering rules. Under the DMA, tech firms are not allowed to block businesses from telling their users about cheaper options for their products or about subscriptions outside of an app store.



“The way that Apple and Alphabet’s implemented the DMA rules on anti-steering seems to be at odds with the letter of the law. Apple and Alphabet will still charge various recurring fees, and still limit steering,” the EU’s competition chief, Margrethe Vestager, said during a news conference Monday.



Apple has already fallen foul of the EU’s rules. This month, the company was fined 1.8 billion euros ($1.95 billion) after the European Commission said it found that Apple had applied restrictions on app developers that prevented them from informing iOS users about alternative and cheaper music subscription services available outside of the app.



In a third inquiry, the&nbsp;commission said it is investigating whether Apple has complied with its DMA obligations to ensure that users can easily uninstall apps on iOS and change default settings. The probe also focuses on whether Apple is actively prompting users with choices to allow them to change default services on iOS, such as for the web browser or search engine.



The commission said that it is “concerned that Apple’s measures, including the design of the web browser choice screen, may be preventing users from truly exercising their choice of services within the Apple ecosystem.”



Apple said it believes it is in compliance with the DMA.



“We’re confident our plan complies with the DMA, and we’ll continue to constructively engage with the European Commission as they conduct their investigations. Teams across Apple have created a wide range of new developer capabilities, features, and tools to comply with the regulation,” an Apple spokesperson told CNBC on Monday.



The fourth probe targets Alphabet, as the European Commission looks into whether the firm’s display of Google search results “may lead to self-preferencing in relation to Google’s,” other services such as Google Shopping, over similar rival offerings.



“To comply with the Digital Markets Act, we have made significant changes to the way our services operate in Europe,” Oliver Bethell, director of competition at Alphabet, said in a statement.



“We have engaged with the European Commission, stakeholders and third parties in dozens of events over the past year to receive and respond to feedback, and to balance conflicting needs within the ecosystem. We will continue to defend our approach in the coming months.”



Alphabet pointed to a blog post from earlier this month, wherein the company outlined some of those changes — including giving Android phone users the option to easily change their default search engine and browser, as well as making it easier for people to see comparison sites in areas like shopping or flights in Google searches.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-meta-investigation"><a></a>Meta investigation</h2>



The fifth and final investigation focuses on Meta and its so-called pay and consent model. Last year, Meta introduced an ad-free subscription model for Facebook and Instagram in Europe. The commission is looking into whether offering the subscription model without ads or making users consent to terms and conditions for the free service is in violation of the DMA.



“The Commission is concerned that the binary choice imposed by Meta’s ‘pay or consent’ model may not provide a real alternative in case users do not consent, thereby not achieving the objective of preventing the accumulation of personal data by gatekeepers.”



Thierry Breton, the EU’s internal market commissioner, said during the news conference that there should be “free alternative options” offered by Meta for its services that are “less personalized.”



“Gatekeepers” is a label for large tech firms that are required to comply with the DMA in the EU.



“We will continue to use all available tools, should any gatekeeper try to circumvent or undermine the obligations of the DMA,” Vestager said.



Meta said subscriptions are a common business model across various industries.



“Subscriptions as an alternative to advertising are a well-established business model across many industries, and we designed Subscription for No Ads to address several overlapping regulatory obligations, including the DMA. We will continue to engage constructively with the Commission,” a Meta spokesperson told CNBC on Monday.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-tech-giants-at-risk-of-fines"><a></a>Tech giants at risk of fines</h2>



The commission said it intends to conclude its probes within 12 months, but Vestager and Breton during the Monday briefing stressed that the DMA does not dictate a hard deadline for the timeline of the inquiry. The regulators will inform the companies of their preliminary findings and explain measures they are taking or the gatekeepers should take in order to address the commission’s concerns.



If any company is found to have infringed the DMA, the commission can impose fines of up to 10% of the tech firms’ total worldwide turnover. These penalties can increase to 20% in case of repeated infringement.



The commission said it is also looking for facts and information to clarify whether Amazon may be preferencing its own brand products on its e-commerce platform over rivals. The commission is further studying Apple’s new fee structure and other terms and conditions for alternative app stores.



This month, the tech giant announced that users in the EU would be able to download apps from websites rather than through its proprietary App Store — a change that Apple has resisted for years.



The EU’s research into Apple and Amazon does not comprise official investigations.

107381656-1709554734955-gettyimages-1232607338-AA_30042021_335705

EU launches probe into Meta, Apple and Alphabet under sweeping new tech law

<figure class="wp-block-image size-full"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="740" height="416" src="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/107386763-1710330203990-gettyimages-1998660059-2024-2-9dfdfe.png" alt="" class="wp-image-465858" srcset="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/107386763-1710330203990-gettyimages-1998660059-2024-2-9dfdfe.png 740w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/107386763-1710330203990-gettyimages-1998660059-2024-2-9dfdfe-300x169.png 300w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/107386763-1710330203990-gettyimages-1998660059-2024-2-9dfdfe-160x90.png 160w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 740px) 100vw, 740px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Artificial Intelligence: the new technology that has taken the sector by storm.  Just_super | E+ | Getty Images</figcaption></figure>



The European Union’s parliament on Wednesday approved the world’s first major set of regulatory ground rules to govern the mediatized artificial intelligence at the forefront of tech investment.



The EU brokered provisional political consensus&nbsp;<a href="https://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/press-room/20231206IPR15699/artificial-intelligence-act-deal-on-comprehensive-rules-for-trustworthy-ai" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">in early December</a>, and it was then endorsed in the Parliament’s Wednesday session, with 523 votes in favour, 46 against and 49 votes not cast.



“Europe is NOW a global standard-setter in AI,” Thierry Breton, the European Commissioner for internal market, wrote on X.



President of the European Parliament, Roberta Metsola, described the act as trail-blazing, saying it would enable innovation, while safeguarding fundamental rights.



“Artificial intelligence is already very much part of our daily lives. Now, it will be part of our legislation too,” she wrote in a social media post.



Dragos Tudorache, a lawmaker who oversaw EU negotiations of the agreement, hailed the agreement, but noted that the biggest hurdle remains implementation.



Born in 2021, the EU AI Act divides the technology into categories of risk, ranging from “unacceptable” — which would see the technology banned — to high, medium and low hazard.



The regulation is expected to enter into force at the end of the legislature in May, after passing final checks and receiving endorsement from the European Council. Implementation will then be staggered from 2025 onwards.



Some EU countries have previously advocated self-regulation over government-led curbs, amid concerns that stifling regulation could set hurdles in Europe’s progress to compete with Chinese and American companies in the tech sector. Detractors have included Germany and France, which house some of Europe’s promising AI startups.



The EU has been scrambling to keep pace with the consumer impact of tech developments and the market supremacy of key players.



Last week, the Union brought into force landmark competition legislation set to rein in U.S. giants. Under the Digital Markets Act, the EU can crack down on anti-competitive practices from major tech companies and force them to open out their services in sectors where their dominant position has stifled smaller players and choked freedom of choice for users. Six firms — U.S. titans Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Meta, Microsoft and China’s Bytedance — have been put on notice as so-called “gatekeepers.”



Concerns have been mounting over the potential for abuse of artificial intelligence, even as heavyweight players like Microsoft, Amazon, Google and chipmaker Nvidia beat the drum for AI investment.



Governments fear the possibility of deepfakes — forms of artificial intelligence that generate false events, including photos and videos — being deployed in the lead-up to a swathe of key global elections this year.



Some AI backers are already self-regulating to avoid disinformation. On Tuesday, Google announced it will limit the type of election-related queries that can be asked of its Gemini chatbot, saying it has already implemented the changes in the U.S. and in India.



“The AI Act has pushed the development of AI in a direction where humans are in control of the technology, and where the technology will help us leverage new discoveries for economic growth, societal progress, and to unlock human potential,” Tudorache said on social media on March 12. 



“The AI Act is not the end of the journey, but, rather, the starting point for a new model of governance built around technology. We must now focus our political energy in turning it from the law in the books to the reality on the ground,” he added.&nbsp;



Legal professionals described the act as a major milestone for international AI regulation, noting that it could pave the path for other countries to follow suit.



“Once again, it’s the EU that has moved first, developing a very comprehensive set of regulations,” said Steven Farmer, partner and AI specialist at international law firm Pillsbury.



“The bloc moved early in the rush to regulate data, giving us the GDPR, which we are seeing a global convergence towards,” he continued, referring to the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation law. “The AI Act seems to be a case of history repeating itself.”



Mark Ferguson, public policy expert at Pinsent Masons, added that the passage of the act was just the beginning, and that businesses will need to work closely with lawmakers to understand how it will be implemented as the fast-moving technology continues to evolve.

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