India must drive AI diffusion to stay competitive: Microsoft's Crampton

Microsoft's Responsible AI Chief Natasha Crampton says India must strengthen AI diffusion nationwide to remain competitive as the Global South faces widening adoption and capability gaps

India needs to drive effective diffusion of artificial intelligence (AI) across the country to compete with other countries and economies that have taken the lead in developing frontier AI models and services, Natasha Crampton, vice-president and chief responsible AI officer at Microsoft, said. 

“What we have learnt from studying general-purpose technologies of the past is that it is not actually the inventors of the technology that get the highest and best use of that technology,” she told Business Standard on the sidelines of the AI Impact Summit here. 

The company has announced that it will invest up to $50 billion to ensure that AI is widely adopted across the Global South. This, Crampton said, is an urgent priority, as there is a growing divide between the Global North and the Global South regarding AI use. 

“We know from past experience on general-purpose technologies that this is not a gap we want to exacerbate. So we need to take steps to close it right away,” she said.

 

The first part of the $50 billion investment will focus on increasing the infrastructure in Global South countries such as the US, while the second part will focus on skilling and technology investments, particularly for teachers and non-profit organisations, Crampton said.

 

A third important aspect covered by this investment will be the multilingual, multicultural aspect of AI, ensuring that the technology works in the languages people use, while the fourth aspect will be supporting local and community-driven innovation.

 

AI cannot be helpful to people in their day-to-day lives if it cannot speak their language and help solve their problems in that context, Crampton said.

 

“The fifth part of this programme is supplying data about what we can see about AI diffusion so that we help policymakers plan for the future and really target their intervention,” she said.

 

Achieving the diffusion of AI across multiple levels will require multi-stakeholder cooperation across sectors, with participation from both the government and the private sector, Crampton said.