In an exclusive episode of the Washington AI Network Podcast, Anne Bouverot, France’s Special Envoy for Artificial Intelligence (AI), sat down with Washington AI Network founder Tammy Haddad at STATION F in Paris to unveil her vision for the highly anticipated Paris AI Action Summit, set to take place this February. Hosted at the iconic Grand Palais and the world-renowned STATION F, the summit aims to unite over 95 heads of state, global tech leaders, researchers, and civil society to address the transformative opportunities and challenges posed by AI. In the interview, Bouverot detailed the summit’s agenda for fostering international collaboration, grounding discussions in scientific consensus, and addressing pressing issues like climate change, workforce transformation, and inclusivity in AI development.
Bouverot joined Haddad on the occasion of the No AI Without Women conference hosted at the French Presidency at the Elysée Palace, on behalf of the European Network for Women in Leadership (WIL Europe)) and the think tank La Villa Numeris on December 5th part of the official “Road to the AI Action Summit” series of events.
Bouverot on the goals of the AI Action Summit: “We really have this global ecosystem of AI coming together to discuss what we collectively want AI to be. There are risks and there are opportunities, and that’s why we’re calling it an action summit. We want to mitigate the risks. We want to lean into the opportunities and focus on the commons of AI, the things that we want to build together.”
Bouverot on the AI Action Summit agenda: “We’re going to try and show at the summit, concrete applications of AI in real life, in particular, health, education, climate, and climate is another area where we’ve seen a big change. These huge energy demands, this race to place long-term contracts, to have enough energy for enough data centers, that race to the bigger is better. That’s also something that we’ve seen.”
She also anticipates that many of the women leaders in AI from around the globe will be featured in the summit, including Joelle Pineau at Meta, Joëlle Barral at Google, Guillemette Picard at Ubisoft, Fei-Fei Li at Stanford, Sara Hooker at Cohere, Cina Lawson in Togo, Paula Ingabire in Rwanda, Josephine Teo in Singapore, and Lucilla Sioli for the AI office in Europe.
Bouverot on women innovators: “There is no AI without women…We really want to put a focus for the AI Action Summit on getting to interact with all these great women, getting to know more of them…and ensuring AI is not built without women.”
Bouverot on Startups’ Role in AI Development: “There will be lots of startups from all around the world. There’s great startups…There’s lots of them. So the role of large companies and small companies is very important. The role of governments is important, and they cannot alone guide this, because really it’s linked to research, and the role of research is really important, and the role of civil society. So it’s only by bringing everyone together that you can start seeing the road and the avenues for important things and important markers for the summit.”
Bouverot on Collaboration Amidst Global AI Rivalries: “While countries and companies are in competition, and clearly, we need to acknowledge that. And clearly, the US has started this race in the lead, very clearly. Clearly, China is doing a lot of things. Clearly, France and Europe are doing a number of things in other countries, and this competition will continue. That’s really a fact. But also, we’re going to try and still, despite the competition, focus on the things that people will still want to agree on. Because I think you can compete, but also want to do things that are either useful to everyone or beneficial for people in societies and the planet.”
In addition, Bouverot discussed the impact of AI on climate, the global workforce and education.
Bouverot on AI’s Dual Role in Tackling Climate Change: “There’s, of course, the great benefit that AI can bring to climate. For example, optimizing water consumption or energy consumption, or designing better batteries to store renewable energy, or helping with more accurate weather forecasts for disasters, typhoons, earthquakes, etc. And that’s one of the areas of AI and climate, which we will talk about. And there’s also the other side, which is the huge demand for almost limitless amounts of energy, with potential carbon impact, with water consumption, rare materials.”
Bouverot on the Future of Jobs in an AI-Driven World: “Yes, some jobs will disappear. I mean, for example, dubbing and subtitles, that’s something that AI can do very well. But it’s also creating new jobs. I mean, data scientists, cybersecurity experts, prompt engineers, that’s a new job that didn’t exist a year ago. And then there’s the wide middle, I would say, 70-80% of jobs that are changing. And so you need to train, to reskill, to reorganize work, to discuss with the unions. You need to do a lot of work, and everyone has questions around that.”
Bouverot on AI and education: “You can alleviate some of the administrative burden that teachers have, and they have a lot of it. You can personalize the way you help students and pupils learn. You can help them understand the tools, the potential negative effects and positive effects, and you also need to reassure the parents and everyone that this is being done in a good way. So helping teachers, helping parents, helping students is very important.”
Listen to the full interview HERE and watch it on video HERE
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