Study: China and India are better prepared for AI than the West
A survey of corporate executives in India, China and five Western countries shows that China and India are best prepared for the arrival of artificial intelligence. Of the western countries, Australia has the lowest score.
There are quite large differences between the countries studied – the US, Great Britain, France, Germany, India, China and Australia. China and India are leading the way in the extent and readiness of AI adoption, AI skills and initiatives to expand the use of AI. Australia scores 16 percentage points lower than leader China in these areas.
According to the report, a possible explanation for the fact that China and India score the highest can be found in the fact that these countries use relatively few outdated systems and business processes, which makes it easier to integrate AI.
Australia’s regional head of Infosys, Andree Growth, told The Guardian that the Australian economy is at risk of becoming significantly less competitive if AI adoption, integration and development are not accelerated. According to Groth, Australia is lagging behind the other countries in particular in the field of AI skills.
The survey shows that a total of 64 percent of all respondents from all countries together believe that the future of their organization stands or falls with the large-scale application of AI. In addition, 53 percent of the surveyed executives state that ethical concerns will hinder the effective use of AI. Only 36 percent of those surveyed report that their organizations have considered the ethical issues surrounding AI.
Future job losses due to AI appear to be less than expected, according to the survey, as 80 percent of executives say their companies will relocate if AI makes their job redundant. Nevertheless, 71 percent say AI will be inevitable and disruptive. However, 70 percent believe that AI can bring about positive changes in society.
The survey interviewed 1,600 executives in the IT and business sectors. All these executives come from different companies and organizations from all kinds of sectors. The companies and organizations in the study all have more than 1,000 employees and a minimum annual turnover of $500 million or more.
The study, presented last week at the World Economic Forum, was commissioned by Infosys. The company hired technology market specialist Vanson Bourne to conduct the investigation.
The report cites an AI definition by MIT professor Marvin Minsky. He describes AI as the science of making machines perform tasks that would be considered intelligent if they were performed by humans. Simply put, ai is any activity that could previously only be performed by a person, but can now be performed by a computer. Examples include machine learning, speech recognition and image recognition.