SINGAPORE — Opportunities for the use of artificial intelligence (AI) abound in the Asia-Pacific (APAC) region but a lack of harmonized regulations, among others, could limit gains from the technology, speakers at a Reuters forum said.
During a panel discussion at the Reuters Next conference on Tuesday, Greg Lavender, executive vice president and chief technology officer at Intel Corp., said that AI would particularly be beneficial for the region’s skilled workers.
In developing and using AI, workers in the region — particularly those involved in the software and intellectual property sectors — can “get smarter themselves,” he added.
Lavender also said that the personal computer would get “more personal.” Intel is pushing the adoption of AI-powered PCs, last year introducing a platform that incorporates a neural processing unit to handle AI processing instead of relying on the cloud to do so.
But Renee Lo, partner chief technology officer at Google, noted that the diversity of the APAC region and the lack of coordinated regulations would be hurdles.
“We have to ask what is APAC,” she said, pointing to the lack of a regional regulatory body amid the opportunity of bringing diverse cultures together with the use of AI.
Kang So-Hyun, regional managing director of the Project Management Institute, echoed this by noting demographic differences such as Japan having an aging population and a need to upskill in Indonesia.
She said this would require finding a balance between democratizing data and providing adequate protections.
Grab Chief Technology Officer Suthen Thomas Paradathetht pointed to mobile phones being the main devices used in the region to access online services, which could drive the way AI is developed for APAC use.
Still, the speakers said that AI would increasingly be adopted given demonstrated benefits such as improved production processes and other applications for businesses. Existing AI models have also developed to the point that usage has also become easier.
Paradathetht said there was “regulatory openness” to adopting the technology, while Kang said that AI had “gotten over the hype cycle.”
Acknowledging fears that AI would lead to job losses, Lo said the current situation could be seen as a “deja vu moment” given similar concerns that were raised when automated teller machines were first introduced.
Bank tellers instead can now work better, she said, stressing that the focus in adopting AI should be “putting the use case … at the core.”
Zhang Kaifu, group vice president at Alibaba and head of the firm’s AI initiative, said that adoption would accelerate once use cases were determined.
AI offers opportunities that are “different” and “everywhere,” he said, adding that AI also lowers the barriers to entrepreneurship.
Zhang said that technology has also improved with available open source models now “good enough” compared to when OpenAI was the only game in town.
He was optimistic that AI would boost Alibaba’s potential, claiming that innovation in China was now at par with the United States amid heightened tensions between the two countries.
Alibaba is already making money from AI, he said, with 300 million consumers and over 100 million merchants worldwide.
The firm also has 40 demonstrated use cases, Zhang said, with its multimodal AI models capable of handling basic translation and content localization, and also more sophisticated tasks such as offering deals and negotiating with customers.
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