Reenchanting industries with AI

AI, another stage of the digital revolution (the third technical revolution), has all the characteristics of a generic, general purposes technology, one that will deeply and widely impact production, consumption and social life and already affects many fields such as media, healthcare, finance, automotive, energy, research, and even agriculture and education. It opens a transformative period of decades of change, with an extraordinary potential in situation analysis, problem solving, decision support and productivity gains. As for earlier technological revolutions, it also creates anxiety, as labor will be displaced and many practices, skills and industries may become obsolete while new ones are still unknown. Programmed to replace humans in routine tasks, the development of AI could threaten many professions, including white collar jobs. It also faces challenges through copyright lawsuits and deviant uses, and it comes with daunting ethical issues.

How best can we prepare for the future and manage to reap the benefits from AI while successfully addressing the challenges brought by its development? How to improve the efficiency of traditional industries, and transform existing business models? What competitive advantages can AI offer companies? How can it be used ethically and responsibly?