Artificial Intelligence is certainly an area of focus post Brexit, the sector of AI was worth around $1.2 trillion as of around 2018 with predictions from Zdnet.com estimating the growth of the AI business values to around $3.9 trillion by 2022, that's a huge amount for any sector; this roughly equates to a forecasted prediction of just over £3 trillion globally.
Therefore, it is crucial that we pay very close attention to the technology sectors of the market, especially AI. According to official statistics, the UK is accountable for over one third of AI start-up companies in Europe, this is twice as many as any other nation on the continent and amounts to just under 500 start-ups. Compare this with the EU, Germany has around 196 and France just slightly ahead with 217; Spain are third in the EU with 166 AI start-up firms with the Republic of Ireland home to 75 and Italy to 66. Britain has been one of the two global financial capitals, with New York, since the 1980s and the emergence of the financial sector and services sector in Britain, we took the opportunities to become market leaders in both and are now a hub, this is our chance to become true global market leaders in artificial intelligence.
Britain is already prospering in this field with investment in UK AI start-ups nearly as much as the whole of Europe combined, 82 new capital venture projects raised over $1.3bn which is a six times increase from the last five years, according to stats from Tech Nation. Brexit is the perfect opportunity to expand on our already flourishing AI sector, the figures mentioned regarding investment in British AI start-ups belittles the investment in French AI firms which amounted to $400m and $300m in those from Germany. Even the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, Jeremy Wright, confirmed that the UK is without a doubt Europe's tech hub. The government also recently promised to boost the number of graduates in the UK with over 200 Masters in Artificial Intelligence; with Wright also adding that "seven million jobs could be created in the UK alone by 2037 in the AI sector". This just proves that AI is crucial for the British economy post-Brexit and may be the source of mass employment and like I stated previously that we could be the global leader in AI.
In addition to this, by 2037 the British economy could by boosted by £232bn according to Mr Wright, thanks to developments in the technology sector and more importantly AI. There may also be some other benefits of AI apart from the huge economic boost and exporting of the tech produced in the UK, and those benefits would be the fact that productivity will more than likely increase which would lead to more competitive exports in other fields, such as manufacturing. Of course, this will also boost the economy in the opportunities that progress in this field will create such as new jobs, currently, there are around 1500 vacancies in the UK for qualified labourers in this field. Just in the AI field alone, jobs are being created by the day and start-ups are starting up in this sector more than any other in the UK.
AI isn't just a sector in itself but can enhance the productivity and possibilities of other industries and areas such as communication such as voice control and improving customer experiences and service; in perception for example industrial analysis and authentication; in general day to day life for example consumer targeting but also in the medical industry for diagnosing patients quicker and more accurately. Furthermore, AI could be used in the Brexit process itself or at least in planning, for instance, on the borders at Calais and Dover and all other UK and EU ports to check goods entering and exiting. You can read more about no deal Brexit preparations in my previous article here http://www.brugesgroup.com/blog/there-is-no-such-thing-as-no-deal
Not only that, the official government report on AI states how Britain's world class universities and education is paramount in developments in this sector; for example, three of the world's top ten universities are in the UK, with the other seven being across the pond, the Eurozone's top universities don't even make it into the top 25 with the closest being Switzerland's ETH at 11th place, in fact the highest any Eurozone uni comes is 32nd globally and that is LMU Munich. This firms up the point that post-Brexit we should be focusing resources on educating students in the field of AI to create a truly untouchable Artificial Intelligence sector.
References:
https://www.mmcventures.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/The-State-of-AI-2019-Divergence.pdf
https://www.zdnet.com/article/artificial-intelligence-will-be-worth-1-2-trillion-in-2018/
